SBI has not written-off Kingfisher's loans: Arun Jaitley

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday said that Rs 1,200 loans to Vijay Mallya’s defunct Kingfisher Airlines were not written off by State Bank of India (SBI) and that he still was liable to pay the amount even though they were marked as NPAs in the accounting books of the lender.

Jaitley said this when CPM General Secretary Sitaram Yechury sought to know during a debate on demonetisation in the Rajya Sabha about SBI’s write-off as reported by media. Yechury said it was something that was not going to be realised.“Bad loans write-off doesn’t mean we won’t pursue it. The NDA government has inherited a legacy of bad loans,” Jaitley



said. 

According to a media report, Kingfisher’s Rs 1,200 crore in dues had been labelled as write-off in the books of India’s largest state-owned lender.The bank had moved loans to the tune of Rs 7,016 crore to a category called AUCA or Advance Under Collection Accounts that included Kingfisher’s loans too. 

The move allows the lenders to take the bad debt off their books while keeping alive the option of pursuing its recovery.

Mallya owes to lenders including SBI close to Rs 6,000 crore loaned to the defunct Kingfisher Airlines. SBI also tried to auction Mallya’s property to recover part of the loan but it hardly got any buyer.