Finance Minister P Chidambaram is scheduled to meet select bankers in Mumbai on Monday to impress upon them the need to increase lending to productive sectors including infrastructure projects so as to boost economic growth.
He is expected to meet officials from select banks including SBI and Bank of Baroda, among others, according to sources.
Besides, they added, Mr Chidambaram is likely to meet investors and impress upon them that India is safe and attractive destination for investment.
The Finance Minister is likely to ask banks to increase lending to productive sectors to prop up growth and will also try to address the concerns of the banks.
Deteriorating asset quality of banks is expected to come up for discussions at the meeting.
India's GDP growth hit a decade low of 4.5 per cent in the third quarter of fiscal year 2012-13.
Gross non-performing assets (NPAs) of PSU banks have risen from Rs 71,080 crore as on March 2011, to Rs 1.55 lakh crore as on December 2012, of which corporate accounts constitute 53.68 per cent.
Of that, about 172 corporate accounts had NPAs of more than Rs 100 crore at the end of December. The amount involved in such cases is about Rs 37,194 crore.
At a meeting on March 18 with bank chiefs, Mr Chidambaram had expressed concerns about stalled projects, leading to slowdown of the economy.
Despite several steps being taken by the government to promote investments, as many as 109 private sector projects, each worth Rs 1,000 crore or more, are awaiting clearance from different ministries.
Terming stalled projects as worrying, Mr Chidambaram had said steps are being taken to ensure that impediments are removed and credit flow takes place.
As many as 215 projects with an investment of Rs 7 lakh crore are stalled and banks have already disbursed about Rs 54,000 crore loan towards them, Mr Chidambaram had said.
Besides, there are 126 new projects for which the outlay is Rs 3.55 lakh crore and amount sanctioned by banks against these was Rs 43,000 crore.
"The main reasons (for delays) are coal linkage, environment clearances, land acquisition," the Finance
Minister had said, adding that there is now a greater degree of confidence than was there 6 months ago.
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