Mumbai, September 10, 2026: The next phase of India’s banking transformation will be driven by artificial intelligence that can move beyond assisting customers to acting on their behalf, State Bank of India Chairman Challa Sreenivasulu Setty said while speaking at Global Fintech Fest 2026 on Day 2.

Addressing the fintech industry, Setty highlighted the growing role of agentic AI in banking and said the technology could help India move from digital financial inclusion towards what he described as “intelligent inclusion.”

He noted that India’s financial transformation over the past decade was built primarily around inclusion rather than technology for its own sake. Initiatives such as Jan Dhan, Aadhaar and UPI helped bring millions of people into the formal financial system while creating a digital infrastructure capable of operating at massive scale.

According to Setty, the next stage of this transformation will involve making financial services more personalised, responsive and intelligent through AI.

From AI-assisted banking to agentic banking

SBI has already been using artificial intelligence and machine learning across several banking functions, including customer service, pre-approved lending, credit assessment, cash-flow-based lending, fraud detection, anti-money laundering monitoring and early warning systems.

However, agentic AI represents a different stage of adoption, Setty said, as it can potentially move from performing defined tasks to taking actions on behalf of customers.

He identified several potential applications across the financial lifecycle, including fraud and new-account detection, KYC and AML processes, loan appraisal and underwriting, reconciliation and customer lifecycle management.

For customers, agentic AI could enable more contextual financial services and proactive assistance, rather than simply responding to individual requests.

At India’s scale, the technology could help improve decision-making, reduce response times and strengthen controls across the financial system, Setty said.

Building AI for India’s diversity

Setty stressed that India’s requirements are distinct given the country’s large and diverse population.

He said the next frontier for Indian AI should not only focus on building larger models, but on developing systems capable of understanding the country’s linguistic, cultural and economic diversity.

The availability of digital identity infrastructure, payment systems, account aggregators and the Unified Lending Interface provides an expanding foundation for AI-driven financial services, he said.

For Bharat, voice-enabled banking could emerge as a particularly important application, enabling customers who are more comfortable speaking than typing and those who prefer languages other than English to access financial services more easily.

Democratising financial intelligence

One of the larger opportunities presented by agentic AI, according to Setty, is the democratisation of financial intelligence.

Financial advisory and personalised services have traditionally been concentrated among affluent and digitally savvy customers through wealth management and premium banking offerings. Agentic AI could potentially extend personalised financial assistance to a much wider customer base.

Setty also pointed to the economics of deploying AI at scale, particularly through mobile devices. While the initial cost of developing and deploying advanced AI systems can be significant, lower incremental costs could eventually enable wider adoption.

He emphasised the need to develop more scalable and cost-efficient AI models and computing infrastructure suited to India’s requirements.

Trust must be built into AI

With greater autonomy comes greater responsibility, Setty said, noting that an error made by an autonomous system could potentially trigger a chain of actions across multiple systems.

He outlined three principles for building trust in agentic AI in financial services: accuracy, accountability and access without asymmetry.

Financial AI systems, he said, must deliver consistent performance across different customer segments rather than relying on average accuracy. Accountability must also be designed into systems through monitoring, traceability and the ability to understand why significant actions were taken.

At the same time, AI-driven services should be accessible without bias, with technology adapting to customers rather than requiring customers to adapt to the technology.

‘Know your agent’ could become the next priority

The rise of autonomous AI systems could also reshape how banks approach risk management.

Setty said that as agents increasingly participate in financial transactions, banks may need to move beyond traditional “know your customer” frameworks towards mechanisms for knowing and authenticating the agent involved in a transaction.

This could involve agent identity, authentication, customer consent, transaction limits, audit trails and real-time monitoring.

He also highlighted the possibility of an increasingly AI-driven financial environment where institutions may have to assess interactions between multiple autonomous systems using identity, behavioural and transaction intelligence.

Human oversight remains critical

Despite the growing role of AI, Setty emphasised that technology should augment rather than replace human capabilities in banking.

Routine, high-volume and data-intensive activities can increasingly be handled by AI, allowing employees to focus more on relationship management, complex problem-solving and customer engagement.

For high-risk and complex financial decisions, maintaining appropriate human oversight will remain important, he said.

Setty also stressed that the transition to agentic AI would require collaboration across the ecosystem, involving governments, regulators, banks, fintech companies and technology providers.

India, he said, has already demonstrated that trusted digital infrastructure can operate at the scale of a billion people. The next opportunity is to make intelligent financial services accessible to that same population.

The broader ambition, according to Setty, is to move from digital inclusion to intelligent inclusion, with trust remaining at the centre of India’s next phase of financial transformation.