NEW DELHI: Interim Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said that even there are sufficient powers with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the government is open to giving more powers to the Central bank, a week after RBI governor Urjit Patel had sought more power to deal with Public sector Banks.
“Personally I do not believe there is any shortage of powers but we will have discussion with RBI and sort them out.. .. If there are any more additional powers required, government is open to that” Piyush Goyal told reporters after meeting heads of public sector banks (PSBs) here.
Goyal's comment came after Urjit Patel’s response to the parliamentary standing committee that the central bank lacked enough powers to effectively regulate Public Sector Banks (PSBs).
On June 12, Urjit Patel had appeared before the Parliamentary Standing Committee, where he said that RBI needs more regulatory powers, citing at least 10 areas regarding effectively regulating PSBs.
Goyal who met the head of PSB’s for the second time this month to discuss the issue of NPAs and better governance of the PSBs told that public money is safe with the PSBs and “frauds are being conducted by private sectors and not by public sector”.
To improve the credit, he said that the centre has decided to adopt a two-pronged approach to improve the functioning of public sector banks (PSBs) by “ironing out issues of consortium-based lending” and identifying “good borrowers.
He said that bank chiefs have “made decision” to extend credit to MSMEs and “genuine small businesses”
“One of the thoughts before the PSBs has been that they will have to get into the act of working to support MSMEs and genuine good companies who need working capital finances or loans or investment asset but have had some difficulty in the past,” Goyal said.