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Apparantly, Mobile Banking can be said to consist of three inter-related concepts: Mobile Accounting; Mobile Brokerage and Mobile Financial Information Services. Most services in the categories designated Accounting and Brokerage are transaction-based.
The non-transaction-based services of an informal nature are, however, essential for conducting transactions - for instance, balance enquiries might be needed before committing a money remittance. The accounting and brokerage services are, therefore, offered invariably in combination with information services. Information services, on the other hand, may be offered as an independent module.

Over the last few years, the mobile and wireless market has been one of the fastest growing markets in the world and it is still growing at a rapid pace. According to the GSM Association and Ovum, the number of mobile subscribers exceeds 2.5 Billion, of which more than 2 Billion are GSM. This part of the mobile commerce is very popular in countries where most of their population is unbanked. Countries like Sudan, Ghana and South Africa received very well this new commerce. In Latin American countries like Uruguay, Paraguay, Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Guatemala, and recently Mexico, it started with a huge success. In Colombia, it was released with Redeban. In Guatemala, it has the support of Banco Industrial. Mexico released the mobile commerce with Omnilife,Bancomer and a private company (MPower Ventures).

The mobile phone culture is growing and has penetrated the urban and semi-urban population in India. The number of mobile users is estimated to have far surpassed the number of Internet users. Recently, in India, there has been a phenominal growth in the use of Mobile Banking applications with leading banks adopting Mobile Transaction platform and the Central Bank (RBI) publishing guidelines for mobile banking operations.

Two important, yet quite unrelated, events in the evolution of mobile payments in India occurred in 2008. Firstly, the new credit policy of the RBI came along with guidelines for facilitating mobile payments. Secondly, according to Dr. Raghu Raghuraman's CSFR Report, Mobile banking is the most promising front-end technology for broadening the access of finance in the country. Taken together, these are defining moments in the recognition of mobile now as an accepted channel for banking and commerce, and clearing the way for its rapid and mass deployment across the country by the financial sector. Technology related regulation can never keep pace with the fast-pace nature of technology innovations and progress, nor fully define it. Regulation here has to have a light touch, so as not to throttle innovation, yet, serve public interest.

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Dr. Gursharan Singh Kainth started his career as Lecturer at Post Graduate Dept. of Economics, Government College, Gurdaspur, and later at Khalsa College; Amritsar, specializes in Quantitative & Development Economics. Has the distinction of serving Punjab Agricultural Univ, Ludhiana, for more than 2 decades and remained Director-Principal of Saint Soldier Management & Technical Institute, Jalandhar. Currently, heading GAD Institute of Development Studies, Amritsar, a self-financed research institute. Has been honoured with various awards, including Guru Draunacharya Samman, Vijay Rattan Award, etc.
Article posted on December 1, 2008.