The recent SC direction to the Reserve Bank to report the annual analysis and names of those who have purposefully committed default in bank loans should be seen as a move against the irregularities in the banking sector. The court also asked to review the revelation policy of the Reserve Bank and clarified that this would be the last chance. The court was considering the contempt of court case against the Reserve Bank filed by RTI workers Gireesh Mittal and Subash Chandra Agarwal.

The Supreme Court had directed in 2015 to report the information abiding the law, but the Reserve Bank sought other ways to overcome this. Loans are granted from taxpayers’ money. It’s within the right of the citizen to know about the purposeful lapses in loan repayment. It’s suspicious when the Reserve Bank tries to deny the details that can be rightfully obtained through RTI. The banks follow a different set of rules for the wealthy and the common sections of the society in terms of granting and repayment of loans. Despite protests, there is no visible change to this double standard attitude. Banks can’t keep hold of the big sharks who seem less interested in the repayment of loans. It will be easier to write off these debts to balance accounts.

The outstanding debt of banks in the nation stands at Rs 10 lakh crores. According to official data, public sector banks lost Rs 22473 crores in the past three years through different scams. The debts committed by businessmen like Nirav Modi and Vijay Mallya will amount to Rs 40528 crores. On the other hand, three lakh farmers committed suicide due to loan debts in the last 20 years. This is such an unfortunate situation. The banks never resort to tougher means to recollect the loans from the big sharks. However, if the common man commits a lapse for even a single time, they’ll not be given any peace of mind. Public sector banks had to write off outstanding debts of Rs 156702 crores. The new gen banks closely follow; they wrote off Rs 109076 crores.

The common man was able to avail small loans when branch managers were authorized to grant it. When the core banking solution was implemented, banking procedures got centralized at head offices and zonal offices. This motivated banks to encourage big loans to achieve targets easily. The banks started looting the common man in the name of service charges and other charges. The big sharks managed to evade the widespread raids against the illegal currency. Some escaped to foreign nations. The attempts to bring back some of these offenders should be appreciated.

The Supreme Court’s new order should be paving way for a new system in the repayment of loans. The attempts to cover up the transactions that demand transparency should be to attend to the interests of the corporates. The allegations against the CJI can be read along with this.