The Finance Minister also cited the case of a power producer to which a distribution company owed money and said that just because the discom did not pay up, the power producer does not become a defaulter. Goyal’s comment came just a day after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) made it clear that it is not having a relook at a contentious circular about recognising of bad assets, issued on February 12 last year.
“I think it is worth discussing with the Reserve Bank that if a payment is overdue and discom is not paying its bill, then we will have to think about NCLT and NPA,” Goyal added. However, some sections of the industry have recently moved the Supreme Court (SC) seeking special treatment to the power sector when it comes to the classification of NPAs.
Exhorting the industry to report any such instances, Goyal said the government could ensure capital markets watchdog Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) withdraws a proposal to disclose every default by listed companies and hinted that similar measures will be taken up with RBI as well.
Further speaking about the need for specialised development finance institutions like IDBI, IFCI and ICICI, he said that asset-liability mismatch results in difficulties for the banking system to support the infrastructure sector. The Finance Ministry is also trying to get the remaining eight banks out of the restrictive prompt corrective action (PCA) framework, he added.