Bangladesh has reached another new milestone in defaulting loans. Now the defaulted loans in the banking sector have exceeded 100 million rupees. When the Awami League government was formed in 2009, it inherited 22 thousand 481 crores of defaulted loans. After one financial sector scam after another and repeated opportunities to defaulters, the default increased to Tk 1 lakh 25 thousand 257 crore 57 lakh.

This information of defaulted loans is given by the banks. But concerned persons think that its amount is much more than this. Because this information of defaulted loans is given by the banks themselves. Now Bangladesh Bank can inspect and see what the real picture is. One example is enough for now.

For example, the private sector Union Bank’s own non-performing loans are 3.49 percent. But the Central Bank inspected Union Bank last April and said that in fact 95 percent of their loans are in default. In the sum of Rs. 18 thousand 346 crores. Bangladesh Bank’s new governor Abdur Rauf Talukdar also said last week that the central bank has identified 10 banks as weak.
Apart from this, in 2019, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) gave a report on the country’s banking sector and said that defaults are hidden in Bangladesh. The data on defaulted loans is much higher than the actual defaulted loans. In total, the defaulted debt of Bangladesh will be about two and a half lakh crores of taka.

Moinul Islam, the former president of Bangladesh Economic Association, told Prothom Alo about this that the IMF said that the actual defaulted debt is more than Tk 2.5 lakh crore. Taking that account, now the actual defaulted loans have actually exceeded 4 lakh crores of rupees. In this, the Finance Minister has given various facilities to the defaulters, through which the defaulted loans have been hidden under the carpet. So now the information of 100 lakh crore rupees is given, that calculation is false
Generally, data on defaulted loans is calculated every three months. During last March-June, defaulted loans in the bank sector increased by 11 thousand 816 crore 71 lakh taka. And during this time, the total debt of the bank sector has increased to 13 lakh 98 thousand 592 crores.

According to bank sources, the loan defaults have started to increase step by step after the withdrawal of the concession given in the collection of bank loans due to Corona. Before this, the defaulted loans increased by about 10,000 crores during January-March. People related to the banking sector say that the loans which have been rescheduled for special consideration are defaulting again. Besides, the incentive loans that have been distributed are also defaulting. As a result, defaulted loans are increasing.

According to the data, at the end of last June, defaulted loans of state-owned banks have increased to 55 thousand 428 crores. In this case, the default rate is about 22 percent. Non-performing loans of private banks stand at 62 thousand 677 crore taka, which is 6 percent of total loans, non-performing loans of foreign banks are 2 thousand 956 crore taka (4.40 percent) and 4 thousand 194 crore taka or 11.74 percent of specialized banks.
According to bank sources, the facility given by the central bank to not repay the loan has made the customers reluctant to repay the loan. In the last two years, the businessmen were good customers in the bank accounts even though they did not repay the loans. In this situation, after Abdur Rauf Talukdar joined as the governor last July, Bangladesh Bank issued a policy related to defaulted loans with major concessions. As a result of this, in the future, defaulted loans will decrease on paper.