NPA WRITEOFFS BY PSBS SURGE TO ₹1.20 LAKH CRORE IN FISCAL 201718

Public sector banks have written off bad loans worth a whopping ₹1.20 lakh crore, an amount that is nearly one-and-ahalf times more than their total losses posted in 2017-18, according to official data.

This is a double whammy for the struggling PSBs as they had massive write-offs as well as huge losses in the last financial year. This is for the first time in a decade that banks have made huge write-offs of bad loans along with booking of hefty losses.

Till 2016-17, 21 state-owned banks made combined profit while in 2017-18, they posted a staggering loss of ₹85,370 crore, as per the data.

During 2016-17, PSU banks wrote off non-performing assets (NPAs) worth ₹81,683 crore as against combined net profit of ₹473.72 crore. SBI alone has written off bad loans of ₹40,196 crore, nearly 25% of the total write-offs during 2017-18. This was followed by Canara Bank (₹8,310 crore), Punjab National Bank (₹7,407 crore) and Bank of Baroda (₹4,948 crore).

As per the data provided by rating agency Icra, Indian Overseas Bank has written of NPAs worth ₹10,307 crore, followed by Bank of India (₹9,093 crore), IDBI Bank (₹6,632 crore) and Allahabad Bank (₹3,648 crore). These banks along with 7 others come under Prompt Corrective Action framework of RBI.

As per the government data, banks’ write-offs stood at ₹34,409 crore in 2013-14. The figure has jumped nearly four-fold in five years.

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