Bank credit growth picked up for the fortnight ended October 5, growing by Rs 42,895 crore to Rs 48,09,384 crore, said the Reserve Bank of India data released on Wednesday. For the previous fortnight, the growth was Rs 16,795 crore at Rs 47,66,489 crore.
In the October 5 fortnight, deposits also grew by Rs 1,20,162 crore to Rs 64,11,036 crore, compared with a fall of Rs 30,152 crore for the previous fortnight at Rs 62,90,874 crore.
Credit grew by 15.9 per cent on a year-on-year basis, while deposits grew by 13.9 per cent.
The first half of the current fiscal has been sluggish in terms of credit growth. However, bankers expect the second half to be better.
To drive credit growth, banks now focus on retail credit in a big way. “I agree that focus is given on retail loans, because they are not much subdued at this moment. We are giving emphasis even on Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and agriculture loans, too. So, taking all these loans together, we should be able to achieve credit growth target,” said D Sarkar, chairman and managing director, Union Bank of India.
