Financial literacy is the ability to understand and apply financial knowledge, attitudes and behaviours when making decisions about saving, borrowing, spending, investing, insurance, pensions and digital payments. In India, the expansion of formal financial access and digital transactions makes financial capability increasingly important, but access alone does not guarantee that people can compare products, understand compounding, manage debt or avoid fraud. This paper reviews the relationship between financial literacy and financial inclusion in India through secondary sources, with emphasis on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the National Centre for Financial Education (NCFE), the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), and the OECD/International Network on Financial Education (INFE). The study uses a descriptive, document-based methodology. It synthesises policy documents, official financial-inclusion indicators, international measurement frameworks and selected research literature. The analytical framework treats financial literacy as multidimensional: knowledge, behaviour, attitudes and digital financial safety. The evidence indicates that India has developed a substantial institutional architecture for financial education, while continuing to face the practical challenge of converting awareness and access into informed, resilient financial behaviour. The RBI reported a Financial Inclusion Index of 64.2 for March 2024, a year-on-year increase of 6.8%, and reported scaling its Centre for Financial Literacy project to 2,421 centres during 2024–25. These are indicators of system-level inclusion and programme reach, not direct proof that every household is financially literate. The paper concludes that financial education is most useful when it is continuous, locally relevant, delivered in accessible languages and paired with safe opportunities to practise. It recommends school and college modules, community-based instruction, responsible digital-finance training, transparent evaluation and stronger coordination among regulators, banks, educators and civil-society organisations. Because the paper uses secondary data, its findings are analytical rather than causal; a future district-level survey is proposed to test differences by age, gender, education, occupation and rural–urban location

Kapil Ramesh Lavhale, Dr. Ujwala Narkhede, "Financial Literacy in India" International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development, V9(5): Page(1486-1504) September - October 2026. ISSN: 2581-7175. www.ijsred.com. Published by Scientific and Academic Research Publishing.