No drastic measures announced for NPA recovery: bank union leader

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has not announced any drastic measures to recover the huge bad loans of government banks, said a top bank employees union leader on Monday.

All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA) general secretary C.H. Venkatachalam also demanded the government should impound the passport of flamboyant tycoon Vijay Mallya.

"The finance minister has not announced any drastic measures to recover the bad loans. The AIBEA has been demanding that government should publish the names of the bank loan defaulters and also give more teeth to the recovery laws but no such announcement has been made in this budget," he said.

"Particularly, the deliberate wilful default of bank loans should be treated as criminal offence and criminal action should be taken on such defaulters. But here also, the government has not done anything," Venkatachalam said in a statement issued here on Monday.

"Soft approach to bank loan defaulters and talking of more private capital in banks only means that the bank loan defaulters can become owners of the banks," he said.

Referring to the news reports about Kingfisher airline promoter Vijay Mallya wanting to settle down abroad, Venkatachalam demanded his passport be impounded and that Mallya should not be allowed to leave India without repaying the loans amounting to Rs.7,500 crore from 17 banks.