New Delhi, 13 December: The country’s banks have written off non-performing assets (NPAs) worth Rs 10,09,511 crore during the last five financial years. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman gave this information in a written reply to a question in the Parliament.
NPAs or bad loans have been written off during the last five financial years, Sitharaman said in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Along with this, it has been removed from the books of the bank concerned. This also includes those bad loans, against which full provision has been made on completion of four years.
The Finance Minister said that the banks have taken these steps as per the RBI guidelines and the policy approved by their respective Board of Directors, which include balance sheet adjustments, availing tax benefits to bring their capital to optimum levels. Regularly write off NPAs.
Sitharaman said that as per information received from RBI, Scheduled Commercial Banks (SCBs) have written off an amount of ?10,09,511 crore during the last five financial years. He said that SCBs have recovered a total of ?6,59,596 crore during the last five financial years. This also includes recovery of ?1,32,036 crore from the loan written off.
She clarified that writing off the loan does not benefit the borrower. The borrower will continue to be liable for repayment. The process of recovery of dues continues. Banks continue their operations to recover the amount written off. These measures include filing cases in courts, debt recovery tribunals, filing cases under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 2016, and sale of non-performing assets, etc.
