Loan write-off part, parcel of lending business: minister

Amid objections by lawmakers for writing off loans of the rich of the country, the Senate was informed on Tuesday that as many as 19 banks out of 34 have written off principal amount of Rs4,653 million out of loans granted since March 2010.
During the question hour, Federal Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar stated in a written reply that the banks, which have written off loans, included Zarai Taraqiati Bank (Rs1,187.365 million), United Bank Limited (Rs971.080 million), Standard Chartered Bank Limited (Rs819.947 million), Bank Islami (ex-KASAB Bank) (Rs540 million) and Allied Bank Limited (Rs271.583 million). The names of other banks that provided this facility included Al Baraka Islamic Bank, Askari Bank, Bank Al-Habib, Bank Al-Falah, Faysal Bank, First Women Bank Limited, Habib Metropolitan Bank, JS Bank, NIB Bank, SAMBA Bank, Silk Bank, Summit Bank, Soneri Bank and The Bank of Punjab.
Senator Dr Jehanzeb Jamaldeni of BNP-Mengal asked if National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) has not waived loans to its customers, as the name of the bank is not included in the list of the banks which have written off loans. Senators Usman Kakar of PkMAP and Tahir Hussain Mashhadi of MQM questioned why ordinary people are not provided with this concession, adding the farmers in Balochistan are discriminated. Kakar said that several farmers are languishing in jails for not making loan repayments in time and their loans should also be written off.
Speaking on behalf of the finance minister, Minister for Climate Change Zahid Hamid brushed aside the impression that the government has anything to do with the writing-off of loans and said it was purely done by the individual banks through their board of directors after exhausting all available avenues of recovery.
He said that globally loan write-off by banks is a part and parcel of lending business: the Financial Institutions (Recovery of Finances) Ordinance, 2001 and National Accountability Ordinance, 1999, are available for recovering the non-performing loans and banks take all possible measures to recover their defaulted amounts through these laws.
The minister said that the Zarai Taraqiati Bank has also written off loans of as many as 11,966 people. He also noted that since the list did not contain the name of NBP, it has not provided this concession to its clients.
Answering another question by Usman Kakar, Minister for Planning, Development and Reforms Ahsan Iqbal said that 75 per cent of $47.957 billion meant for CPEC is investment while the rest is concessional financing at 2 per cent mark-up for 20-25 years, adding $34.740 billion are for energy-related projects.
Apprehensions continued to haunt, mostly the opposition senators, as they said that many roads, under-construction or abandoned, have been shown part of CPEC and they doubted Ahsan Iqbal's assurance that all provinces would have their due share in the CPEC.
One senator chanted 'question' when Ahsan said that the first trial shipment of Chinese containers had passed through the western route. He added that one industrial zone each would be built in all the four provinces at the site of their choice as well as in Gilgit-Baltistan, FATA, Islamabad and Azad Kashmir under this project.
To another question, Dar in a written reply said that ZTBL provided loans to the tune of Rs270.201 billion for inputs and dairy farming livestock, tractors and tube-wells during the last three years.
"There is no proposal under consideration to count Pakistani technocrats, artisans and other professionals working abroad in the forthcoming population and housing census through Pakistan missions abroad," Dar said in reply to a question of Senator Rahila Magsi of PML-N.
He added Pakistan Bureau of Statistics would ask a question regarding family members residing in foreign country for over six months from every household in the population and housing census. The number of males and females living abroad from the same family for over six months would be entered in the column 13 of the questionnaire Form-2.
"It is not a fact that vegetables and spices are being smuggled from India through Wagah border. These items are otherwise freely importable through Wagah Custom Station on payment of duty/taxes. Wagah border is high security zone completely manned and secured by Punjab Rangers while National Logistic Cell is the custodian of the Land Freight Unit," Dar said in response to a question asked by Senator Kalsoom Perveen of PML-N.
Dar said the Privatisation Commission has completed five privatisation transactions during the tenure of incumbent government and generated proceeds of Rs172.870 billion. Senator Muhammad Talha Mahmood had asked the question about details of sell-off of state-owned entities.