Agencies, New Delhi Finance Minister P Chidambaram today asked banks to concrete steps to recover loans, saying Gross Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) of PSU banks have risen from Rs 71,080 crore as on March 2011 to Rs 1.55 lakh crore as on December 2012.
‘We cannot have an affluent promoters and a sick company, ‘ he said. He said promoters have to bring in additional money and companies have the duty to pay back loans. The Minister, however, said recovery has improved in the past two months. Mr Chidambaram appealed to banks to take steps to deal with the rising NPAs, without hurting the industry. ‘Promoters have to bring in additional money and companies have the duty to pay back loans.
Promoters must bring in money, without doing anything that will kill the business of industry,’ he said. The Finance Minister expressed concern at the stalled projects in sectors like power, coal, iron, steel and road transport. ‘As many as 215 projects with an investment of Rs seven lakh crore are currently stalled and banks have disbursed about Rs 54,000 crore loan towards it,’ he said. Mr Chidambarm said five new projects too are in the same boat.
