RBI guv sits with deputies to listen to co-op banks’ issues

The leaders of the co-op banking sector met RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, who sat with his team of all the four Deputy Governors on Thursday evening at RBI’s headquarters in Mumbai. “It was after more than five years that the apex Bank cared to sit and listen to our problems and they listened quite patiently for long two hours”, said one of the bankers.

The meeting lasted two hours-from 4 pm to 6 pm. “The new RBI Governor Mr Shaktikanta Das wanted to understand the issues of co-op banking; it was a nice experience”, said Jyotindra Mehta Nafcub President as soon as he came out of the meeting.

“Das deserves all the credit for restarting the consultative process with the co-operative sector which had been forgotten for many years; we got a chance to apprise him of the issues plaguing co-op banks in the country”, said Dilip Sanghani NAFSCOB Chairman who was accompanied by B Subramaniyam, MD.

Mukund Abhyankar of Cosmos Bank summed up the meeting in these words “NAFCUB insisted on 1) Umbrella Organisation & (2) BoM insistence for getting branch licensing embargo removed. The Governor gave a patient hearing taking notes himself (but no commitment). All 4 Deputy Governors were present at this meeting, which lasted 2 hours.”

Explaining further Jyotindra Mehta said ”we requested the Governor to have a final decision on Umbrella Organization as the matter is pending with RBI for internal scrutiny. We also demanded the revival of OTS (One Time Settlement) which expired long time back”, he added.

Nafscob Chairman and MD raised the issue of loan waiver and requested the governor to use his good offices so that co-op banks get the fund on time from the govt after they have already disbursed the same to farmers. Nafscob also asked for tweaking of Credit Monitoring Norm of 2008 which limits housing loans to Rs 30 lakh from a DCCB or SCB. “Our Chairman wanted the limit to be raised to one crore” said Subraminayam.

“The issue of Nabard refinancing at the rate of 4.5% and that to only up to 45 per cent also came up for discussion. The remaining 55% of credit needs are met using our costly resources. We requested the RBI to look into the matter. We also raised the issue of delayed notification of the Policy of Refinance. It is announced in July while ideally it should have been done in April”, said MD Nafscob.

Rs 114 crore of demonetized notes lying still with 6 DCCBs in the country also seeks an urgent hearing from the RBI, added Sanghani.

Besides representatives of NAFCUB and NAFSCOB, some select Chairmen from both UCBs and State Co-op Banks were also invited and these included Saraswat Bank Chairman Gautam Thakur, Chairmen of both Tamil Nadu State Co-op Bank and that of Maharashtra State Co-op Bank. The RBI was represented by Governor Shaktikant Das and all the deputy governors including P. Congo, N. S. Viswanathan, Viral Acharya and M. K. Jain.