New Delhi, Feb. 18 (IANS): The Congress on Sunday demanded the Narendra Modi government bring a white paper on the health of Indian baking sector and that the banks should declare their losses due to bank frauds as also their total non-performing assets (NPAs) as on December 31, 2017.
"Since the Budget session of Parliament is on, we demand that the BJP-led NDA government bring out a white paper on the health of Indian banking sector," Congress spokesman and former Union Minister Manish Tewari said at a press briefing here.
"Secondly, all the banks , both public and private, must declare and publish a complete list of their NPAs as of December 31, 2017, which is the end of the third financial quarter so that the people know who owes how much money to which bank," he added.
Tewari stressed that the money in the banks is common people's money and they have a right to know, adding that with the latest around Rs 12,000 crore Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam, the total banking frauds would stand at approximately Rs 80,000 crore.
Taking a dig at the Narendra Modi government, he said that while the Congress-led UPA government brought "transparency and openness" - such as through the RTI Act which allowed people to peer into the "opaque innards" of governance - the Modi government has only brought "secrecy and opaqueness" in the last four years.
"The Prime Minister would not tell you who are the people travelling with him on his foreign trips because it is presumably a state secret. Private people travelling with the Prime Minister on taxpayers' money despite the CIC order will not be disclosed because it is a great state secret.
"The Defence Minister will not tell you what si the cost of a Rafale jet, the Finance Minister will not tell you the health of Indian banking sector and the Information and Broadcasting Minister won't tell you her educational qualification because these are all state secrets," he added.
