Public sector banks wrote off loans worth Rs 6.1 lakh crore in last five fiscal years: Centre

Public sector banks have written off loans worth Rs 6.1 lakh crore in the last five financial years and the first half of the current fiscal year, the Union Ministry of Finance told Parliament on Tuesday.

Writing off a bad loan allows a bank to move a non-performing asset out of the assets side in its books and list it as a loss. This helps the bank reduce the number of its non-performing assets and lowers its tax burden, as the amount written off is not classified as profit.

The ministry said that there has been no capital infusion by the Union government into public sector banks since the financial year 2022-'23. “Public sector banks have improved their financial performance, turning profitable and strengthening their capital position,” it added.

The Union government said that the public sector banks now rely on market borrowing and internal accruals to meet their capital requirements. They have raised Rs 1.7 lakh crore through equity and bonds since April 1, 2022, till September 30 this year.

The information was shared in response to a question on whether the government plans to infuse capital into public sector banks, the amount of bad loans written off by public sector banks and the impact of such write offs on the liquidity of the banks.

The finance ministry said that the write offs do not result in the waiver of liabilities of borrowers to repay.

The recovery of written off loans is an ongoing process and the banks have continued to pursue their recovery actions through several mechanisms, the ministry said.

The actions include filing cases in civil courts and debt recovery tribunals, initiating action under the 2002 Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interest Act, and approaching the National Company Law Tribunal under the 2016 Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code.

The government said that since provisioning for bad loans had already been made, writing off loans did not involve any actual cash outflow and therefore did not affect the liquidity of the banks.

The provisioning of bad loans means the setting aside of funds, usually from the bank's profits, to cover expected losses from loans that borrowers may default on.

It added that write offs are part of a routine balance sheet clean-up exercise.

Source: Scroll
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