In India, individual companies, directly or indirectly connected with large industrial houses were permitted to own only 10 per cent of the equity of a bank, but without any controlling interest. However, the Reserve Bank has now guided a more open regime but this regime would need to be developed with lots of checks and balances and not sacrificing the essential safeguard principles.
In case banks do not demonstrate customer centricity in their operations, it would be fair to expect that the society would not only demand but force a change in the financial sector architecture involving a move towards a twin peaks approach with a dedicated market conduct regulator.