Public sector banks have bad loans over Rs 80,000 crore in 2016-17

Public sector banks wrote off a record of Rs 81,683 crore worth of bad loans in the financial year thqat ended in March 2017. According to Finance Ministry, non-performing assets in 2015-2016 were Rs 57,586 crore, which is 41% less than the latest figures.

Despite banks being directed to take several mesures against non-performing assets, including changing loan recovery laws, and empowering the Reserve Bank of India to rapidly start insolvency processes against stressed assets.

So far, the Reserve Bank of India has asked banks to begin bankruptcy proceedings against 12 identified accounts of corporate borrowers who owe over Rs 5,000 crore each - and overall involve an amount of close to Rs 175,000 crore - for insolvency proceedings under the newly enacted Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 2016.

On August 3, the Lok Sabha had also passed a bill giving the RBI the power to deal with stressed assets.

Bad loans rose by over Rs 1 lakh crore in the first nine months of last fiscal to Rs 6.07 lakh crore by December 31, 2016, minister of state for finance Santosh Gangwar had said in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha. Public sector banks' gross bad loans stood at Rs 5.02 lakh crore at the end of March 2016, up from Rs 2.67 lakh crore at the end of March 2015.

As per a recent analysis by rating agency Crisil, banks are likely to take a haircut of 60 per cent, worth Rs 2.40 lakh crore, to settle 50 large stressed assets with debt of Rs 4 lakh crore.

OneIndia News