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The 400-mw Maheshwar Hydel Power Project, located in Madhya Pradesh and is stalled since 1998, will now get a renewed thrust from the government with the finance ministry will meet the bankers tomorrow to fund out means on how to kick start the project.
The move comes after the finance minister P Chidamaram identified projects worth Rs 7 lakh crore which are stalled at various stages of implementation. Power sector contributes a major chunk to the stalled projects.
According to lenders, Rajiv Takru, banking secretary in the ministry of finance has called a meeting of bankers tomorrow to discuss various stalled projects and finding ways to revive Maheshwar project, is one of the issues that will be discussed.
Lenders have an exposure of Rs 2,400 crore in the projects which has been stalled due to delay in promoter’s contribution and issues regarding rehabilitation and resettlement.
The promoter of the project, S Kumars was unable to bring its share of contribution after the exit of US-based Ogden Energy, which had 49% stake.
Most of the lenders have classified the loan as non-performing. Some of the lenders which have an exposure to the project are Power Finance Corporation, State Bank of India, IDBI Bank.
The finance ministry will also take stock from banks about its preparedness on the direct benefit transfer scheme in a meeting with the executive directors of public sector banks.
The government’s flagship DBT scheme had seen only 3.5 crore transactions so far, transferring only Rs 45 crore to Aadhaar seeded accounts of beneficiaries till last month. The scheme, which replaces various kinds of subsidies with direct cash transfers to the accounts of beneficiaries, will be extended to 78 more districts and three more schemes in July.
This will take the scheme to 121 districts covering 29 schemes in about next three months. Installation of onsite ATM in these 121 districts will have to be completed by June 30. So far, nearly 80 lakh bank accounts have been seeded with Aadhaar but many more still remains to be linked.
The finance ministry is procuring micro ATMs and training banking correspondents to carry out DBT transactions. It has asked public sector banks (PSBs) to reach out to customers through advertisements, phone calls, SMS, e-mails and ATMs to seed their Aadhaar numbers into the bank accounts.
It has also asked the banks to ensure that bank accounts are opened within a maximum period of seven days from the date of receipt of application from the beneficiary. Takru may ask officers in the banks and Executive Directors In-charge to closely monitor the progress.
The government will pay a commission of 1% to banks on the total amount transferred under the scheme to compensate Banking Correspondents (BCs). The fee, however, would be paid only till the time necessary software tools to distinguish transactions completed through normal banking channels and BCs are in place.
The commission would be paid subject to the condition that after the next six months, it would be examined by the banks whether the amount transferred through BCs is more than or equal to the amount transferred under DBT. If it is found that the amount transferred through BCs is less than the amount transferred under DBT, the commission would be reduced on a pro-rata basis.
