The Reserve Bank of India is engaged with all stakeholders to find a ‘workable solution’ for the Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative Bank, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said on Saturday.
Das made the statement while he was delivering a keynote at the 7th State Bank of India Banking and Economics conclave.
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“With regards to the Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is engaged with all stakeholders to find a workable solution as losses are very high, eroding deposits by more than 50 per cent,” Das said.
Das further talked about how the central bank has tweaked its lending norms for the Urban Co-operative Banks (UCBs) to make sure that they lend more money to the sectors for which they were initially intended to lend to.
“RBI has taken a number of measures to strengthen co-operative banking system. Yes Bank is one such example where RBI proactively acted. The reconstruction scheme was implemented quickly to safeguard depositors Interest and financial stability. Specialised handling of weak institutions helps us determine risks in a timely manner,” he added.
While speaking about the capital position of the public sector banks (PSBs), the Governor said that government has infused Rs 3.08 lakh crore in them and their overall stressed assets have fallen drastically resulting in better and improved capital position of PSBs in the last few years.
“The rising stress is obvious and possibilities of increasing vulnerability and rising non-performing assets (NPAs) is a given naturally,” he said adding, therefore, the recapitalisation of PSBs is requisite.
Pointing out the difficulties, notions and tests that the COVID-19 represents to the financial systems the central bank’s Governor said that banks have to work beyond arranging necessary financial capital and they need to improve their governance as well as management skills.