The All-India Bank Employees’ Association (AIBEA) has condemned the demand of the Assocham (Associated Chambers of Commerce of India) that the public sector banks (PSBs) be privatised in view of the recent fraud in Punjab National Bank (PNB). C.H. Venkatachalam, General Secretary of AIBEA, said in a statement here that if private banks are really efficient, why were so many banks closed down and merged with others in the past. Most of the private banks were merged with PSBs.
“PSBs have become ‘Neelakanta Mahadev’ to swallow the ‘poison of failure’ of many private banks. It is funny that Assocham is asking PSB to be privatised now,” he said. On the huge increase in the bad loans in banks, he said the private companies, industrialists and corporate houses are the delinquents and defaulters, and wondered should PSBs be privatised and handed over to these people.
Stating that bulk of the loans given by PSBs are to private corporate houses, he asked why these corporate houses have not taken such loans from private banks if PSBs are not efficient. Assocham should ask private sector corporate defaulters to repay the bank loans to the PSBs and condemn Nirav Modi for the fraud he has committed on PNB, Venkatachalam said.