India Inc owes Rs 13500 cr to banks

Demanding that willful default to banks be made a criminal offence under the Securitisation Act, the Delhi unit of All India Bank Employees Association on Monday said the corporate sector owes Rs 13,500 crore (Rs 135 billion) to banks and financial institutions in the national capital.

Flaying Finance Minister P Chidambaram for his reported statement that defaulters list should not be published as such a move would tarnish their reputation, the Delhi State

Bank Employees Federation said it seems that the government has no political will to tackle the problem.

Earlier, CPI MP Gurudas Dasgupta had released the list of defaulting companies at the national level in March. The AIBEA list that time had said the corporates have defaulted to the tune of Rs 3,00,000 crore, most of which is written off.

Rejecting the government's statement that NPAs are on downswing in the banking system, Ramanand said bad debts were lowered through jugglery of accounts.

By waiving off NPAs and reclassifying accounts, NPAs are shown to be on decline.

Stressing that Rs 13,500 crore is only the principal amount of NPAs, the Delhi body said if overdue interest is added and other accounting juggleries removed, the sum will reach Rs 1.5 lakh crore.

Similar lists of defaulting companies were released in other state capitals by AIBEA units.

To a query, he said banking unions will resort to agitations to begin with to press for their demand to make willful default to banks a criminal offence.

Central trade unions are meeting on July 9 on larger issues of BHEL divestment and other economic policies of the UPA government. The issue related to NPAs will also be part of the agenda to be deliberated on it, he said.