Islamic Finance is a more than USD 2.5 trillion industry today and is emerging as one of the fastest growing areas of international finance. Currently Islamic banking and finance practices have a presence in over 75 countries of the world; these include many countries of Europe,North America, South-East Asia and Africa.

India Inc. having sensed the momentum building up in favour of Islamic Finance, has started looking for strategic vantage positions to exploit the niche opportunity. Many Indian private sector players have come up with Shariah Compliant products abroad. A few of them have launched products and services in India as well. Some financial institutions such as HSBC, Goldman Sachs, TATAs, Taurus, UTI, Kotak, BajajAllianz, have some kind of Shariah Compliant products already in the market.

Government of India too is seriously contemplating various options for allowing Islamic finance in the country. The publication of Mohanty Committee (Committee on Medium-term Path on Financial Inclusion) Report and the proposal by Islamic Cooperation for the Development of Private Sector (ICD) – a 100% subsidiary of the Jeddah based Islamic Development Bank (IDB) - to establish a NBFC to facilitate regular financing activities for businesses in India, are some of the notable milestones in this area. These developments are definitely encouraging pointers towards the increasing interest of the government in Islamic finance which has for far too long been ignored in our country when nations across the globe were benefiting from it.