Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to meet CEOs of public sector banks on Aug 25

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is scheduled to meet heads of public sector banks (PSBs) on August 25 to review the financial performance of the lenders. The meeting is aimed to assess the progress made by the banks to support the economy battered by the Covid-19 pandemic. This will be the first physical review meeting since the outbreak of the pandemic in March last year.

Sitharaman had earlier said that the government is ready to do everything required to revive and support economic growth hit by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Growth will be given its importance. Growth will be pushed both by the Reserve Bank and by us…,” she had said.

The meeting is expected to take evaluate the situation in the banking sector, progress on restructuring the 2.0 scheme announced by Reserve Bank of India (RBI). It is also likely that the banks may be nudged to push loan growth in productive sectors.

FM will also review the revamped Rs 4.5 lakh crore Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) during the meeting likely to be held in Mumbai.

She will also take a stock of the bad loan or non-performing asset (NPA) situation, and discuss various recovery measures by banks.

As a result of the government’s strategy of recognition, resolution, recapitalisation, and reforms, NPAs have since declined to Rs 7,39,541 crore on March 31, 2019, Rs 6,78,317 crore on March 31, 2020, and further to Rs 6,16,616 crore as on March 31, 2021 (provisional data).

The government had taken comprehensive steps to control and to effect recovery in NPAs, which enabled PSBs to recover Rs 5,01,479 crore over the last six financial years, the government informed Parliament recently.