With businesses taking a major hit since demonetisation was announced, the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) are now facing a new challenge — how to repay their existing loans on time and avoid having their loans be declared as Non-performing Assets (NPAs).

NCR Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Gurgaon) President H.P. Yadav said that even as industries grapple with the note ban, banks are mounting pressure on them to repay the existing loans and are issuing threats that their loans would be declared as NPA.

Yadav said that India was going through major economic changes and most industries and commercial organisations were in deep financial crisis as they were not getting any new orders or projects and their due payments were also blocked with clients.

Yadav said that the economy may take nearly six months to recover from demonetisation.

“In these circumstances, it would be irrational to declare the loans as bad loans or NPA as most of the companies have been in business for nearly four decades and they have been repaying their loans regularly without failure,” said Yadav.

“If these MSME companies are declared NPA then 30 years of their hard work will be ruined without any fault of theirs. Thousands of employees will become jobless. The present situation is not under anybody’s control,” said Yadav.

Yadav said that the NCR Chamber of Commerce and Industry has written to the Reserve Bank of India to grant a three-month grace period to MSMEs for loan repayments.

Source: The Hindu