Measuring the performance of the Indian banking industry: data envelopment window analysis approach

Abstract

PurposeThis study aims to empirically evaluate the performance of commercial banks operating in India.Design/methodology/approachThe efficiency of the commercial banks is evaluated using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach. We measure the technical, pure technical and scale efficiency of the sampled conventional banks using the input-oriented model. We employed an extended DEA window analysis approach based on a panel sample of 47 banks in the Indian scenario. The period of study is from 2009 to 2018.FindingsThe results obtained from CRS and VRS measures envisage that Indian banks have failed to manage their inputs efficiently and convert them into outputs. It implies that Indian banks do not operate at an optimum level. Moreover, the results show that public banks exhibit superior efficiency scores followed by private and foreign banks. Apart from the aggregate sector level, we also investigate the performance of Indian banks at the individual level for in-depth analysis. The individual bank-level analysis reports that the public sector banks (PSBs) are the most efficient followed by foreign banks, whereas, the least efficient are the private banks.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings of our study have implications for government, financial institutions and policymakers to access the verve and flexibility of the Indian banking system. The government should consider restructuring inefficient banks to enhance overall performance. This can be considered by improvement in managerial efficiency, efficient allocation of scarce resources and appropriate scale of operation. However, the findings of the study should be interpreted in light of the period of study for the banks being operational (as we filter out banks that ceased to exist) in India and empirical methods employed. The results may vary if alternative measures are used.Originality/valueThe present paper investigates the efficiency of the Indian banking sector employing the Data Envelopment Window Analysis (DEWA) technique. To the best of our knowledge, the present study is perhaps the first one to employ the DEWA measure on the Indian banking industry to gauge their performance over time.