1. What is GyanDhan all about and what inspired you to start the company?
GyanDhan, the brainchild of Mr.Ankit Mehra and Mr. Jainesh Sinha, operates a marketplace for education loans. The inspiration for the new-age FinTech came from the personal experience of the founders and a dire need to streamline the student loan process. Mr. Ankit, who completed his MBA from IESE Business School in Barcelona, faced several challenges to finance his master’s degree from abroad. A similar financial situation troubled Mr. Jainesh Sinha, who is an alumnus of IIT-Delhi. They identified several hiccups and roadblocks that needed to be urgently addressed to make education financing more affordable and accessible. They partnered with major lenders in the market to tackle issues like archaic documentation systems, procedural delays, limited products, and processing time that plague the segment. The in-depth analysis of the market resulted in a credit score called the GyanDhan Credit score that accurately calculates the creditworthiness of an applicant and the risk involved, helping the company and the lender make an objective decision. The initial focus of the company was to service abroad education financing needs. However, it has recently forayed into the domestic market providing easy financing options to study in India as well. The company has been successful in its operations as more than 5500 students have availed of its services to finance their education since its inception in 2016. The role of the company has also evolved over the years, from a middleman between the lenders and the students, it has now become an NBFC. It will help handle end-to-end customer experience while making it as hassle-free as possible.
2. What do you mean by GyanDhan Score and how does it work?
GyanDhan score is an in-house evaluation model that assesses the students’ loan eligibility and accurately calculates the creditworthiness of an applicant. The score is calculated after factoring in the academic profile of the student, future employability potential, target course – ranking, and employment opportunities in that field. It is assigned to the student when they check their loan eligibility on the company website. The main purpose of the model was to look beyond the usual eligibility markers used by the traditional lenders, that is the value of the property pledged by the applicant. The eligibility of an applicant should rest on their ability to repay the loan. In order to judge that, the future employability of the student and the graduating salaries had to be taken into account.
3. How is the student loan market in the present scenario, during Covid in India?
The effects of the pandemic were quite severe on the education loan market of India with respect to the repayment and the demand. The NPAs, which were already a problem, rose to 9.55% at the end of 2020. And the demand for education loans in the domestic segment had gone down, primarily because schools
