Bad Money: Inside the NPA Mess and How It Threatens the Indian Banking System

Bad Money: Inside the NPA Mess and How It Threatens the Indian Banking System

About the Book

Over the last decade, Indian banks in general and the government-owned public sector ones in particular have gradually got themselves into a big mess. Their bad loans, or loans which haven’t been repaid for ninety days or more, crossed Rs 10 lakh crore as of 31 March 2018.

To put it in perspective, this figure is approximately seven times the value of farm loan waivers given by all state governments in India put together. And this became the bad money of the Indian financial system. Why were the corporates unable to return these loans? Was it because they had no intention of doing so? Who were the biggest defaulters of them all? Are Vijay Mallya and Nirav Modi just the tip of the iceberg? How much money has the government spent trying to rescue these banks? How are the private sector banks gradually taking over Indian banking? Is your money in public sector banks safe? How are you paying for this in different ways? And what are the solutions to deal with this?

In Bad Money, Vivek Kaul answers these and many more questions, peeling layer after layer of the NPA (non-performing assets) problem. He goes back to the history of Indian banking, providing a long, deep and hard look at the overall Indian economy. The result is a gripping financial thriller that is a must for understanding a crisis that threatens our banking system and economy.

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What people are saying

‘Vivek Kaul’s book on the NPA crisis in the Indian banking sector provides a rare combination of incisive analysis with the readability of a gripping detective story. Kaul is one of the very few commentators on the Indian economy whose views rise above the usual chatter of “up and down” commentary on economic trends. He delivers real insight combining a thorough grasp of institutional detail, an eagle-eye for patterns in data others are missing out, all anchored in a clear understanding of economics. And he writes with such fluency and clarity!’ 
Maitreesh Ghatak
Professor of economics, London School of Economics