With few halal investment options India’s Muslims resort to creative ways for wealth management
Photo: Muslims offer prayers inside a mosque during the holy fasting month of Ramadan, in Srinagar June 13, 2017. REUTERS/Danish Ismail
An absence of Islamic banks and few halal investment options in the country force the largest minority community into creative ways to make their wealth grow
Mohammed Ali, a Mumbai-based retired employee of the Comptroller and Auditor General’s office, found his haj plans in jeopardy when the Indian government announced its demonetisation drive on November 2016, overnight declaring 500 Indian rupee and 1,000 rupee currency notes invalid unless they were deposited into a bank account before the end of that year.
While most of Ali’s savings and pension are parked in public sector banks in India, where savings accounts by default earn about 4 percent interest and fixed deposits earn you anywhere between 7 and 10 percent, he had set aside what he terms ‘halal cash’ to go on haj.
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Shalini Seth, White Paper Media