BORROWERS ARE DUTY BOUND TO REPAY THE LOAN:
JASWANT SINGH
CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE OF THE
FINANCE MINISTRY MEETS
The Union Finance Minister, Shri
Jaswant Singh has said that the borrower must realize that he
has a duty to repay the loan. In his first address to the Parliamentary
Consultative Committee for the Ministry of Finance, he said that
an environment needs to be created for this to overcome high default
rate. Shri Singh said, the recent Ordinance on setting up of ARC
and Securitization was aimed at providing the Banks/FIs a window
to market their NPAs.
The Finance Minister agreed to
the suggestion by the members that rural credit delivery network
needed strengthening. He announced the setting up of a Committee
under the Chairmanship of Minister of State for Finance (E,B&I),
Shri Anant Geete to examine the issue and come up with practical
suggestions in this regard. Shri Singh felt that the existence
of many regulators for similar financial operations like NBFC,
Private Companies and Chit Fund Operations caused confusion and
created hinderances in checking irregularities. The Secretary
(Financial Sector) has been directed to examine if a single regulator
was feasible. The Committees are to submit their reports within
four weeks.
The Members expressed concern
over the high Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) of commercial banks
and suggested various measures to tackle the situation. Some of
the suggestions included the setting up of a body to look into
each case of NPA, going for a negotiated settlement of dues, exemplary
punishment for wilful defaulters and strengthening of banks' vigilance
system for preventive action. Dr. Manmohan Singh felt that the
bankers as well as the regulators cannot afford to be complacent.
He said that more attention of banks was needed towards small
scale industry, agriculture and rural industry. Some other members
also supported the cause of SSI, agro-industry, cooperative banking
and rural finance.
All members congratulated the
Finance Minister on his appointment and expressed confidence that
he would restore the people's trust in the financial institutions.
Among
those who attended the meeting included Minister of State for
Finance, Shri Anant Geete, Dr. Nitish Sengupta, Dr. Jaswant Singh
Yadav, Shri Vijay Kumar Khandelwal, Shri Moinul Hasan, Shri Nawal
Kishore Rai, Shri Sontosh Mohan Dev, Shri Mohan Rawale, Shri Parmeshwar
Kumar Agarwalla, Shri Lalithbhai Mehta, Shri B.S. Ramoowalia,
Shri Abani Roy, Shri Baijayant Panda, Shri Eknath Thakur, Shri
Harendra Singh Malik, Shri Lal Jan Basha, Shri Murli S. Deora
and Shri Mahendra Prasad.
