GDP Growth
India’s economic trajectory, as outlined by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, paints a picture of resilience and potential amidst global uncertainties.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is going to chair a meeting with the heads of the public sector banks to discuss the effectiveness of the initiatives taken by the government in the past few months to prop up the economy as well as to make capital available to the lenders.
In the past few weeks the finance minister has held several meetings with the industrialists, economists and state finance ministers. She has been seeking their opinions on how government can reverse or to control the effect of economic slowdown before the ministry starts preparing the next annual budget.
Sitharaman is going to present her second budget on February 1, 2020.
Advertisement
The meeting is also expected to take up discussion on non-performing asset recovery through both NCLT and non-NCLT means, the sources said. Apart from that, Performance review of online platform for auction of secured assets under SARFAESI Act is also one of the agenda for the meeting.
During the meeting, Sitharaman is also expected to review credit availability. Despite the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) making credit cheaper, lending rates are rising for borrowers after accounting for inflation and falling economic growth.
Country’s economic growth has dropped to an over six-year low of 4.5 per cent in the September quarter and is widely expected to slip further with almost all key components of the economy contracting.
The RBI has responded by cutting rates by 110 basis points to a nine-year low of 5.40 per cent.
As bad loan recognition process nears completion, gross non-performing loans of banks improved to 9.1 per cent as of end-September 2019, compared to 11.2 per cent in 2017-18, says an RBI report.
However, the numbers indicate major improvement on a full-year basis, as in 2017-18, the ratio stood at a high of 11.2 per cent and slipped to 9.1 per cent in 2018-19, the RBI said in its annual report on trends and progress of banking in 2018-19.
(With input from agencies)
Advertisement
