Indian banks have written off more than $121 billion in loans in five years: the govt. | Popgen Tech

According to the Union government, Indian banks have written off loans worth more than ₹10 trillion ($121.05 billion) in the last five financial years in an attempt to clean up their balance sheets.

State Bank of India, the country’s largest lender, leads the list with the biggest write-offs at ₹2.04 trillion, the Finance Ministry said in a written reply to a question asked in the lower house of -Parliament on Monday.

Punjab National Bank, another State lender, ranked second with a cumulative ₹923.39 billion in write-offs. Two other public sector banks, Oriental Bank of Commerce and United Bank of India, were merged into PNB in ​​April 2020.

Banks write off loans in an attempt to clean up their balance sheets after setting aside adequate provisions. Once an account has been written off, it does not appear as an asset on the bank’s balance sheet, but efforts to recover rights through bankruptcy proceedings or bad loan sales continue.

State-owned banks have recovered loans worth ₹4.80 trillion in the last five financial years, including ₹1.03 trillion from written-off assets, according to central bank data, the Finance Ministry’s reply pointed out.

Overall, the health of Indian banks has improved with the gross non-performing asset ratio of scheduled commercial banks falling to 5.9% in March 2022, the central bank had said in its biannual publication earlier this the year. The report also highlighted that the ratio could decrease further to 5.3% by the end of this March.