Loan Waiver case: Supreme Court to help SBP in loan recovery

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Thursday said it will facilitate the State Bank in recovering loans that were written off illegally.

During the hearing of the loan waiver case, the court also asked the State Bank to explain how action can be taken against bankers who waived loans tuning to two hundred and fifty-six billion rupees.

The State Bank's counsel told the court that a three- member commission has been set up on the orders of the court.

The commission will present its interim report on the waived loans within three months while the final report will be prepared after six months.

The court directed the central bank to formulate criteria for waiving loans in genuine cases.

As mentioned in an earlier report published in The Express Tribune, the Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry asked to cancel the licenses of banks involved in loan write-offs. He observed that loans worth billions of rupees have been written off by private and national banks.

Chief Justice Chaudhry said the SBP has not taken any significant steps to recover the loans and that the process of loan write-off must be stopped immediately.