A day after applying for a bank licence, Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla today said the new bank licence norms announced by the Reserve Bank are not discriminatory towards large corporate houses.

“The banking licence guidelines are very clear. They are not discriminatory towards large corporate houses,” Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla told reporters on the sidelines of a conference organised by industry body FICCI.

The comments come after Mahindras, another large corporate group, had on Monday said it was keeping itself out of the banking fray as it found the licensing norms too strict for a non—banking finance company like Mahindra Finance.

Birla said, “We are very happy the way guidelines are put across.”

The Reserve Bank had in February said large industrial and business houses, apart from NBFCs and others could enter banking arena if they meet the fit and proper criteria set by it.

Yesterday, the AV Birla group company Aditya Birla Nuvo said in an exchange filing that its board had approved a proposal to apply for a bank licence.

The RBI is in the process of granting fresh banking licences and has set July 1 as the deadline for applying for the same.

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