Canara Bank hides names of defaulters after writing off Rs 1.29 lakh crore in bad loans

Indian banks have written off almost Rs 10 lakh crore due to bad loans in the past five years, largely due to wilful defaulters. On its part, the Reserve Bank of India has assured people that the bad loans at banks will be down by 5.3 per cent till the end of FY23. But things seem that bright for Canara Bank as of now, since it has written off Rs 1.29 lakh crore in bad loans, and is refusing to reveal the names of defaulters on top of that.

What does the bank have to say?

The bank revealed the amount, but in concealed the identity of defaulters on the grounds that it would violate their privacy, in response to an Right to Information petition. The plea demanded details of people who had failed to repay loans higher than Rs 100 crore. But is this refusal to name defaulters a unique or shocking response by the public sector bank?

Not the first PSU to hide information

Turns out that such information has previously been refused not just by another public sector bank such as the State Bank of India, but even the banking regulator RBI is in favour of hiding it. Last year, the SBI had cited an obligation to protect the confidentiality of clients, to deny details of defaulters sought by an RTI query, just like Canara Bank. As for RBI, it straight up refused to reveal the names of loan defaulters back in 2018, in response to another application.

Defying precedents set by apex court

The regulator’s response in 2018, came despite the fact that the Supreme Court of India in 2015 had ordered it to reveal names of defaulters, saying that the RBI had no fiduciary relationship with banks. This is a worrying trend that has been normalised in banks despite legal intervention, since wilful defaults have gone up 10 fold in a decade, and public sector banks are struggling under bad debts.