The Reserve Bank seeks to educate investors in semi-urban and rural areas in the first round of the campaign through advertisements in English and vernacular dailies. The advertisements will speak in great detail on what an investor should look for in an NBFC before making an investment.

The campaign, among other things, will remind investors that NBFCs are not allowed to offer more than 16 per cent interest on public deposits and also that NBFC deposits are not insured and not backed by any security.

The Reserve Bank had, on January 2 this year, announced a whole new set of guidelines for the NBFC sector which were later relaxed after intense lobbying by finance companies.According to the new guidelines, only NBFCs with an investment grade rating can raise public deposits.

The central bank drew a lot of flak after the fall of CRB Capital Markets in May last year when the finance company -- promoted by CR Bhansali -- duped investors of nearly Rs 1,200 crore. The Reserve Bank was charged with not monitoring NBFCs properly as a result of which the finance company went under. A number of investors even went to the extent of demanding compensation from RBI for the money they lost in the CRB scam.

The collapse of CRB triggered off a huge run on deposits of the NBFC sector which resulted in a number of companies being unable to come up with funds to pay off investors.