Bank advances up after farm loan waiver scheme: Govt

Government said that ever since it launched the agriculture loan waiver scheme, bank advances have gone up while net non-performing assets (NPAs) of banks have come down to one per cent.

Minister of State for Finance Pawan Kumar Bansal, while replying to supplementaries in Rajya Sabha, said "though overall NPAs of banks have come down, the net NPAs have come down to a record one per cent".

He added that after the launch of the loan waiver scheme, bank advances have gone up to Rs 21 lakh crore.

Bansal said in March 2008, NPAs of banks were 15.7 per cent, which have come down to 2.3 per cent till December 2008, whereas net NPAs, which were 9.2 per cent, have come down to one per cent.

Replying to another supplementary, the Minister said the government is concerned about cooperative credit structure of cooperative banks and therefore has undertaken corporate restructuring of these banks.