India is stamping out shadow financiers at the fastest pace in recent years, in the latest blow to a beleaguered sector battling a prolonged funding crunch due to rising wariness toward it in the nation’s credit markets. The central bank canceled registrations of 1,851 non-bank finance companies in the year ended March 31, more than 8 times those in the previous year, according to data received from the Reserve Bank of India in response to a Right to Information request. The number of lenders dropped to about 9,700, the lowest in at least a decade, as a result. Firms may be failing to secure the minimum funds needed to operate due to the cash crunch. “RBI canceled permits of these NBFCs as they couldn’t raise even 20 million rupees” to meet regulatory requirements, said Mahesh Thakkar, director general at Finance Industry Development Council.