Bank credit flow increases 29%

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday said the flow of credit from scheduled commercial banks, including regional rural banks, went up by 29.36 per cent on a year-on-year basis to Rs 26,07,404 crore as of October 10 this year as against Rs 20,15,469 crore in the year-ago period.

The growth is much higher than the 20 per cent non-food credit growth targeted by RBI this year. Despite repeated rate hikes, credit growth has hovered around the 25 per cent mark.

The rise in bank credit is attributed to high demand from sectors such as oil firms and fertiliser companies. The RBI data also said the deposits with scheduled commercial banks till the same date rose 21.5 per cent to Rs 34,69,358 crore from Rs 28,54,096 crore in the same period last year.

This growth is also higher than the RBI target of 17 per cent. This includes demand deposits, which have a tenure of up to one year, which rose 19.1 per cent to Rs 4,87,795 crore and time deposits by 21.9 per cent to Rs 29,81,563 crore.