Finance Ministry asks PSBs to review credit to MSMEs

The chief executives of all public sector banks (PSBs) have been directed by Union Finance Ministry to review credit facilities made available to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and take ‘corrective’ actions to ensure the firms get adequate funds.

The Ministry has officially told the PSB chief executives to assign a chief general manager, or a general manager-level officer to “do an in-depth analysis of the progress made and issues in availability of credit, still being faced by the MSMEs”.

The nodal general managers are supposed to submit details to the finance ministry of MSMEs taking credit from banks, non-performing MSME accounts, MSME accounts restructured following the RBI’s January scheme and the MSMEs still uncovered by it, while taking “corrective actions”.

“The heads of all PSBs have been also asked that all sincere efforts should be made so that during the process of formalisation, the MSMEs may not suffer in want of credit which should be available to them as per the extant guidelines,” the finance ministry said in an official statement.