Under the able guidance and active support of the principal Dr. Man Mohan Kaur and entire faculty of Sri Guru Nanak Dev Khalsa College Delhi, we the students of this college formulated a “Society for Financial literacy and Consumer Awareness” for promoting and spreading the knowledge of various laws and practices for safe guarding the interests of consumers and investors.
The society is comprising mainly of college students who are enriched with theoretical knowledge of finance, marketing, management, international business and consumer protection laws and the practical use of this knowledge is required by the innocent consumers and investors, the Society acts as an ideal blend to transform this theoretical knowledge into practical reality which ultimately acts as a catalytic agent in spreading awareness of the same in the population at large.
We as a society for promoting consumer awareness and spreading financial literacy would like to educate the public at large by holding conferences, seminars and road-shows for empowering consumers and investors through education and general awareness. As on date, most of the consumers are even not aware of their legal rights and obligations of manufacturers, traders and marketing agents, which otherwise is protected to a larger extent by creations of various legislations in this field. Even the position of investors in various financial sectors is not much different and they also experience a similar kind of difficulty while investing in various financial instruments. Often it has been noted that though the rights and interests of consumers and investors are protected by law but either due to lack of knowledge or due to poor Implementation of the same, the benefits do not reach the desired persons and here comes the role of the“Society for financial literacy and consumer awareness”.
WHY THERE IS A NEED FOR CONSUMER AWARENESS…?????
In this era of globalization and capitalism the main objective of the producers has mainly shifted towards maximizing their profits by every possible means and in this process they forget their duties and obligations towards end-users and consumers. Sometimes the consumers are even cheated by the trading and marketing community by adopting unfair trade practices for which consumers need to be protected. To prevent such exploitation our Society is transforming the uneducated and exploited consumers by imparting valuable knowledge by holding various seminars, road-shows and conferences thereby converting them into knowledgeable lot. In fact our society is acting more like a supplement to the existing legal protective mechanism for preventing the exploitation of consumers at large in the hands of traders, manufactures and other marketing agents.
WHY THERE IS A NEED FOR FINANCIAL LITERACY……..????
Just like the consumer awareness, the financial awareness has also become very important and essential in today’s world of liberalized global economy where investors need to be properly guided about informed choices in the field of financial products and services in the market. A large chunk of Investors in our country are still not wise enough to invest their hard saved money into a valuable instrument yielding a profitable return countering the inflationary trend of the currency in our economy. It is quite surprising that still many financial instruments available in the Indian market promise very high returns where innocent and uneducated investors get entrapped and even lose their principal amount. Our society has correctly visualized this problem of investors and has started educating this lot of investors and thus spreading financial literacy among them so that they should be protected from being exploited from clever market traders. Even the prime minister has also realized the difficulties of such investors and has initiated a very popular scheme by the name of Jan - Dhan - Yojna in which small investors’ money will be parked in banks, who thereafter will invest the same money in the national economy thereby accelerating the growth of economy as well as safe guarding the return on investment of poor people. Our society is strong supporter of this idea and in spreading financial literacy; we are aiming to recommend this scheme among poor people which will definitely help them in getting safe and better return on their investment.
Besides the above, a new generation of middle income group has started investment in various risky instruments without proper financial planning thereby putting themselves under great strain during any emergency or mis-happening like break down of relations, bereavement in the family etc. Moreover, due to unstable market conditions and fast changing tax structure need for spreading financial literacy and systematic financial planning has become the need of the time and society for financial literacy and consumer awareness will play an important role by educating this new and powerful class of investors by holding seminars and debates. Our society will empower the investor as it gives them an understanding of how to manage their finances in the real economy in order to avoid unnecessary risks, excessive debt and possible financial exclusion. Moreover, it enables people to improve their understanding about various financial products and services.