In the specific case of Ireland, the depth of the recession and the remarkably high elasticity of tax revenues and the Government deficit to the downturn, combined with the unfortunate decision to lock-in a very comprehensive bank guarantee before the potential scale of the banking losses could at all be appreciated, meant that Ireland’s actual and prospective general government debt made a shocking turnaround from about 25 per cent of GDP in 2007 to 117 per cent just five years later.
Further, the underlying objective of the proposed issuance of small finance banks licenses is to facilitate provision of credit to small and hitherto credit starved sections of the society, which has been relying on informal finance channels. v)  Differential licensing of banks  30. RBI has announced licensing of two new banks in the private sector.