During the period 2003 to October 2007, India had granted 19 authorisations to the USA-based banks, most of which also stand utilised. However, during the same period of five years, USA did not authorise any office of the Indian banks in the US territory, vis-à-vis the requests from the Indian banks for setting up three branches, two subsidiaries and nine representative offices.
Some of the requests have been pending with the US authorities for more than five years. Yet another aspect of the foreign participation in the Indian financial sector is the foreign ownership of the non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) operating in India, quite a few of which are the subsidiaries of the foreign banks.