PANJIM: Four days before the Chief Minister’s deadline of announcing initiatives to enable the banks to ease the squeeze on those who have taken mining loans, the Cooperation Minister announced an in principle interest waiver of Rs 40 crore on loans from the Urban Cooperative Banks and Credit Societies. These banks, not directly under the governance of RBI, have a loan exposure of around Rs 250 crore, roughly 25-30 of the total loan exposure. The Rs 40 crore is the interest amount for the last two financial years.
The move is seen as an attempt to keep the other categories of banks interested in keep looking at interest waivers as one of way of reducing the loan burden.
The minister clarified that this proposal would have to be placed before the annual general body meeting for urban cooperative banks. He was replying to question by BJP MLA Vishnu Wagh asking for details of the outstanding amount of loss by banks and credit societies due to closure of mining.
According to the government figures, the total loss suffered was Rs 113 crore with provisional loss while the ‘non paid loan’ was as follows:
On trucks – Rs 77.8 crore; on earth moving machinery – Rs 12.36 crore; on barges – Rs 9.87 crore and others Rs 1.76 crore.
