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The purpose of this paper is to identify factors relevant for financial inclusion (FI) and establish a model that shows how these factors lead to economic development (ED) through FI.

Primary data were collected through structured questionnaire. Out of 350, 311 respondents accurately filled the questionnaire. The data were collected from rural areas of Tamil Nadu. Exploratory factor analysis has been applied to evaluate drivers/factors relevant for FI. Confirmatory factor analysis has been applied to establish reliability and validity of the identified factors. A structural model has been proposed and empirically tested for ED through FI.

The main findings of the current paper are as follows: online banking (OB), understanding banking services (UBS) and financial literacy (FL) are the drivers of FI; FI can lead to ED, as the proposed model of ED, through FI, is supported in the paper (χ²/degree of freedom and CMIN/degree of freedom are less than 3; GFI and AGFI are more than 0.90 and 0.85, respectively). Behavior of the people, with respect to mode of financial transactions, has changed due to demonetization. (The χ² test for mode of financial transaction is significant).

The geographical reach of the sample should cover the whole India. The sample should also have equal representation from rural and urban areas.

The identified factors for FI (OB, UBS and FL) should be more focused to bring about better results for FI in India. These factors can lead to a more effective execution of FI initiatives. In addition to this, policy makers can be confident of relying upon FI as a tool for ED.

The identified three drivers for FI have not been explored earlier. In addition to this, ED (through FI) in the form of structural model has also not been tested earlier. Government of India can realign their policies toward FI by using findings of this paper. In addition to increasing the access of formal financial system to masses, more thrust can be given to OB and FL for better results of FI in India.

The present research aims to study the behavioural intention to use the digital currencies issued by the central bank through the lens of technology acceptance and switching behaviour perspective. The study also proposes to analyse the role of financial constructs to explain the adoption intention.

The current study develops a model by integrating the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) and the push–pull–mooring (PPM) theory of switching behaviour. It amends the same by including financial literacy, financial inclusion and trust. A sample data of 419 respondents has been collected through a structured questionnaire and the PLS-SEM approach has been used for data analysis.

The findings suggest that UTAUT and PPM models can significantly predict individuals' readiness to adopt the central bank digital currency (CBDC). More precisely, performance expectancy, social influence, government support, relative advantage and task-technology fit jointly determine the adoption behaviour. Besides, the financial constructs also affect the intention to use CBDC.

The study is largely based on a quantitative approach with cross-sectional data from an Indian sample. Thus, the findings may benefit from a longitudinal approach with mixed-method data analysis. However, the study elaborates on several implications for policymakers and research scholars.

The present study uniquely integrates the technology adoption perspective with switching behaviour applied to the migration studies. Given the nascent stage of CBDC implementation in many countries, the current study uses a triangulation approach to enhance the understanding of its adoption behaviour.

Since finance is an efficacious instrument for economic development, social inclusion and women empowerment, the present paper examines the determinants of accessing institutional and non-institutional finance across male- and female-headed households in rural India.

Multinomial logistic regression is applied for categorizing households' accessing finance in four categories, namely Only Institutional Finance (IF), Only Non-institutional Finance (NIF), Both Sources of Finance (BF) and Neither Source of Finance (N). Both household and state-level determinants have been analysed. Household data set is sourced from the Situation Assessment Survey (NSSO, 70th round) and state-level data sets from Basic Road Statistics 2016, Agricultural Statistics at a Glance 2016, Rainfall Statistics of India 2014, database on Indian Economy RBI and Census 2011. Econometric regressions have been evaluated for female-headed households (FHHs), male-headed households (MHHs) and overall pooled households (HHs).

Four important findings emerge. First, FHHs have a lower probability of accessing IF and a higher probability of accessing NIF vis-a-vis MHHs. Second, in general, education levels, monthly household consumption expenditure, land size holding, irrigated area and penetration of scheduled commercial banks favourably influence FHHs accessing IF. Third, FHHs belonging to socially disadvantaged castes have a lower probability of accessing IF. Fourth, a substantial proportion of FHHs accesses neither IF nor NIF relative to MHHs.

The paper thoroughly addresses the issue of accessing finance by FHHs and MHHs, which will further assist policymakers in formulating holistic financial policies for rural India.

The paper recommends increasing women's access to financial services as an effective tool for reducing poverty and lowering income inequality in rural India.

This article contributes to the scant empirical literature on finance and gender.

The study attempts to explore the determinants of financial inclusion. Subsequently, it examines the effect of financial inclusion on financial well-being of marginalized street vendors in India.

The demand-side analysis of measuring financial inclusion with a sample of 371 marginalized street vendors is adopted. Both exploratory and descriptive research designs are employed in this study. The primary data collection is done by administering the structured interview schedule by using a convenience sampling technique. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modeling (SEM) are performed to describe the latent constructs and their hypothetical relationships with adequate empirical evidence.

Out of five dimensions of financial inclusion considered for the study, accessibility, availability, usage and affordability are found to be significant determinants of financial inclusion; however, the financial literacy dimension is found statistically insignificant. Further, the study results confirm that financial inclusion contributes substantially to the well-being of marginalized street vendors.

The outcome of the study will facilitate all the stakeholders including policymakers and financial institutions to enact policy guidelines to ensure financial well-being of the marginalized street vendors through financial inclusion initiatives.

Financial well-being through financial inclusion is possible even without the effect of financial literacy from the unorganized sector perspective specifically marglianized street vendors. Thus, it adds new dimension to the existing literature on demand side analysis of measuring financial inclusion.

The importance of gender in inclusive economic growth has been a growing area of research. Finance is seen as an efficacious instrument for social inclusion, and sustainable women empowerment (SWE). The lack of credit access often constrains women to scale up. The objective of this study is to examine the attributes influencing the decision of women to access the credit at the bottom of the pyramid (BoP) and the impact of this credit access on social, psychological and economic dimensions of SWE at the BoP in rural India.

The threshold theory of decision-making in the form of logistic regression (LR) is applied here to analyze the influence of four determinants, namely individual household level (IHLA), social attributes (SA), economic attributes (EA) and ownership of documents (OD) on women’s credit access. Likewise, the same method is applied to study the relationship between credit access and three dimensions of SWE.

The results have revealed a statistically significant relationship between credit access and studied four attributes. Subsequently, a positive relationship has been observed between credit access and dimensions of SWE.

The present study broadly addresses the concern of accessing credit by women at BoP level, which helps the government and policymakers to promote enabling an environment for women entrepreneurship and comprehensive financial policies for the BoP.

This study examines whether Internet penetration has a complementary effect on the relationship between financial access and new business formation in 57 developing economies from 2006 to 2018.

Using the generalised least squares estimator, the authors employ a framework that allows us to distinguish between the marginal impact of financial access on new business formation in developing economies with high and low levels of Internet penetration rates. Furthermore, the authors distinguish between financial institutions and financial markets.

The authors find that increased accessibility for financial institutions promotes entrepreneurial activity, while financial market access has a negative relationship with new business formation. Furthermore, the authors find that the marginal impact of financial institution access increases in magnitude as Internet penetration increases. The effect does not hold for financial markets.

The major limitation lies in the measurement of new business formation, as it focuses on the formal entrepreneurial sector and overlooks the informal economy and entrepreneurs operating as sole proprietors.

Policymakers should continue to promote the development of the information communication and technology sector and digitalisation policy while increasing financial accessibility in the financial system.

This study provides new empirical evidence on the greasing role of technology to leverage the impact of financial access on new business formation. Furthermore, the study distinguishes this effect by differentiating between financial institutions and markets.

This paper examines India's socio-economic attributes and different financial dimensions of financial inclusion (FI).

The paper uses a principal component analysis (PCA) to build indexes related to financial dimensions. It applies the logistics regression model and the Fairlie decomposition method to determine India's socio-economic and financial characteristics of FI.

Based on the logistic regression, socio-economic factors like age, gender, marital status, level of education and religion have an impact on FI. The use of financial institutions has positively contributed to the probability of FI, while the low proximity of financial service providers retards the process of FI. Fairlie decomposition concludes regional disparity and gender disparity in FI; however, the rural–urban gap in FI is not captured by the variables included in the study. The main reasons for the discrepancy are lack of education, financial literacy, the proximity of financial service providers and lack of financial institutions.

This paper makes two important contributions: first, it presents a micro-level analysis of FI across the socio-demographic strata of India, and second, it demonstrates the regional, rural–urban and gender disparity in FI in India.

The current developments in the Islamic capital market raise questions about its one of the main objectives of developing the Islamic capital market is to achieve financial inclusion. Despite its policy significance, the empirical literature offers little evidence of the Sukuk-financial inclusion nexus. Thus, this study aims to contribute to the literature by empirically investigating the impacts of Sukuk financing on financial inclusion in most Sukuk-issued financial markets countries.

In this study, the author used a two-step generalized method of moments (GMM) technique to explore the impact of Sukuk financing on financial inclusion in 18 countries using data from 1995 to 2017.

The study's empirical suggest that Sukuk increases financial inclusion and supports the view that Islamic capital markets' development alleviates financing obstacles and also reflects the critical role of the Islamic capital market as a vital contributor to increasing financial inclusion.

The study recommends that Sukuk could be used as a tool to tackle the issue of financial exclusion.

The Sukuk market development creates new job markets through innovative projects. These jobs lead to increased income for the working class, leading to higher employment and stimulating investment and financial inclusion.

This is one of the first studies to investigate the Sukuk-financial inclusion nexus empirically. Additionally, the study has used advanced panel techniques in the context of Sukuk and financial inclusion linkage.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-06-2022-0424

The paper empirically investigates the impact of financial inclusion on food security. Subsequently, it examines the overall effect of various dimensions of financial inclusion on food security of developing countries using the panel data for the time period of 2004–2019.

To overcome the problem of endogeneity, the study has used a fixed-effect model, two-stage least-square and system generalized method of moments estimation techniques. Secondary data was collected from various websites such as WDI, FAO, UNICEF and UNESCO.

It was found in the study that there is a significant effect of financial inclusion on food security. The evidence shows that if there is more financial inclusion in the country, it will help poor people to cope with difficult situations they face and provide them food security. Financial development, per capita income, agriculture growth and education positively affect food security, while militarization and urbanization have a negative impact on food security. The crux of the analysis is that any country's financial sector is an integral part of any country that supports food security.

The literature does not clearly show the impact of financial inclusion dimensions on developing countries' food security. Therefore, there is a need to use all the dimensions of financial inclusion to check the overall impact on food security. For this purpose, the financial inclusion index is developed. A new dimension of non-life insurance is introduced that has not been used previously by any researcher to check financial inclusion impact.

This study examines the impact of financial institutions access and financial institutions depth on economic growth in 51 low- and lower–middle-income countries from 1996 to 2017.

The study employs an index of financial institutions depth and financial institutions access that considers the multidimensional nature of finance. The study employs a generalised least squares model as the baseline fixed effects model suffers from serial correlation. In addition, the study examines the marginal impact of financial development on growth at varying levels of financial access.

The results show that both financial access and financial depth are positive to growth. However, the marginal impact of financial depth is negative at low levels of financial access, while the finance–growth relationship becomes positive at higher levels of financial access. Results suggest the importance of developing inclusive financial systems that emphasise quality rather than quantity to promote economic growth.

The major limitation lies in the measurement of financial access as it focusses more on financial system penetration and overlooks the other aspects of financial inclusion such as financial literacy and cultural differences.

Developing countries should continue to develop an inclusive financial system that supports the Universal Financial Access 2020 initiative.

This study provides further empirical evidence on the finance–growth literature focussing on the impact of financial inclusion which is scarce. Furthermore, the study employs an index of finance that captures the multidimensional nature of finance.