Credit offtake growth over 23%, breaches RBI's estimate

Credit offtake from banks grew by 23.08 per cent to Rs 37 lakh crore during the one-year period ended December 3, 2010, the Reserve Bank said today.

As of December 4, 2009, bank credit had stood at Rs 30.06 lakh crore, RBI said in a release.

RBI, in its annual monetary policy, has estimated that credit would grow by 20 per cent this fiscal.

"The growth in non-food credit of banks is placed at 20 per cent. As always, these numbers are provided as indicative projections and not as targets," RBI had said.

Credit growth has been higher so far this fiscal on account of large borrowings by telecom firms for 3G spectrum (radio waves).

The government realised over Rs 1 lakh crore from sale of spectrum for high speed mobile and broadband services, far higher than the estimated revenue of Rs 35,000 crore in the Budget.

According to analysts, the demand for credit is good and the country can expect robust growth in the current fiscal.

Ratings agencies like Crisil had earlier said that the country is likely to see credit growth of around 20-22 per cent this fiscal.

The Indian economy is recovering from the global financial meltdown that began in September, 2008.

The government had earlier this month revised its GDP growth projection to 8.75 per cent for the current fiscal from the earlier 8.5 per cent on the back of impressive performance by the economy during the second half.

The Indian economy grew by 8.9 per cent during the April-September period.