The Student as Examiner: Decoding the Manufactured Illusion of Piramal Finance’s CRISIL AA+/Stable Rating
The Student as Examiner: Decoding the Manufactured Illusion of Piramal Finance’s CRISIL AA+/Stable Rating Published on 19th January, 2026 (GMT 06:24 hrs) ABSTRACT Credit rating agencies (CRAs) in India occupy a paradoxical position: their ratings shape investor behaviour, influence borrowing costs, and determine market access for corporations, yet they operate within a regulatory and commercial architecture that structurally disincentivizes critical scrutiny and accountability. The issuer-pays model — wherein the rated entity pays the rater — creates endogenous conflicts of interest that privilege quantifiable metrics like capital adequacy and liquidity while marginalizing qualitative governance and forensic risks. This article argues that under such a regime, investment-grade ratings (including the recent CRISIL AA+/Stable assigned to Piramal Finance in early 2026) function less as independent credit assessments and more as manufactured assurances that legitimize capital fl...