State owned Janata Bank is lagging behind in all indicators; on one hand, default loan has increased while on the other, there is scarcity of capital. To add to the woes, operation cost has also soared. In the last year it was Tk 1.06 billion while the bank also incurred a loss of Tk. 60.63 billion in the last one year, informs an evaluation report of the Bangladesh Bank.
To improve the economic condition of Sonali, Janata and Agrani Banks, Bangladesh Bank has been signing memorandum of understanding MoUs since 2007. Central bank underlined several targets in the MoU including recovery of default loan, maintaining loan growth, reduction of operation cost, risk management and development.
Around Tk 100 billion of the bank is stuck with leading eight loan defaulters of the country.
The bank gets Tk 80 billion from two groups and a special monitoring committee has been formed with the DMD and GMs to recover this massive loan.
Sources say that the loans were handed out through corruption and irregularities. Of the eight defaulters, Anan Tex sits on top with a loan of Tk 42.83 billion, followed by Crescent Group with Tk 35.72 billion.
MD of Janata Bank, Abdus Salam Azad, said: “We are trying to recover the money from these two groups but aren’t getting any support from them.”
While professor of the department of economics of Dhaka University, Dr. Abul Barakat, was chairman of the bank, the big loans were disbursed to Crescent and Anan Tex.
As per central bank, the default loan of Janata Bank has increased by three and a half times in one year.
In December, 2017, the default loan of the bank was Tk 58.18 billion which stood at Tk. 173.05 billion in December 2018.
The default loan of Agrani Bank in 2018 stands at Tk 69.93 billion. As per central bank report, three state owned banks had scarcity of provision: Tk 30.87 billion for Sonali, Tk. 593 crore for Agrani and Tk 83.4 for Rupali.
Meanwhile, operation cost of Janata and Agrani has risen. For Janata the rise has been Tk 1.06 billion, while for Agrani it has been Tk. 28 crore. However, operation cost of Sonali has fallen by Tk 520 billion.
Till March this year, the deposit of Sonali is Tk 1.604 billion of which Tk 418.18 billion was disbursed.
Of the loan, 46 percent is default and Sonali stands second with the amount of delinquent loans.
MD of the bank, Obaed Ullah Masud, says: “Steps have been taken to identify the loss making branches of Sonali Bank and adopt remedial measures.”