When it comes to bad loans of banking, the big boys are the bad boys

rupee
The Reserve Bank of India(RBI) released the Financial Stability Report on December 23, 2015. One of the key themes in this report was the fact that large borrowers are the ones who have landed the banking sector in trouble. As the RBI governor Raghuram Rajan wrote in the foreword to the report: “corporate sector vulnerabilities and the impact of their weak balance sheets on the financial system need closer monitoring.”

That is a euphemistic way of saying that corporates are essentially responsible for the rising bad loans of banks. As on September 30, 2015, the bad loans (gross non-performing advances) of banks were at 5.1% of total advances [i.e. loans] of scheduled commercial banks operating in India. The number was at 4.6% as on March 31, 2015. This is a huge jump of 50 basis points in a period of just six months. One basis point is one hundredth of a percentage.

What is the problem here? The inability of large borrowers to continue repaying the loans they have taken on in the years gone by. As on September 30, 2015, loans to large borrowers made up 64.5% of total loans. On the other hand, bad loans held by large borrowers amounted to 87.4% of total bad loans.

What this means is that for every Rs 100 of loans given by banks, Rs 64.5 has been given to large borrowers. At the same time of every Rs 100 of bad loans, large borrowers are responsible for Rs 87.4 of bad loans. Hence, large borrowers are clearly responsible for more bad loans.

As on March 31, 2015, bank loans to large borrowers made up 65.4% of total bank loans. At the same time, the bad loans of large borrowers constituted 78.2% of the total bad loans. What this means is that for every Rs 100 of loans given by banks, Rs 65.4 was given to large borrowers. At the same time of every Rs 100 of bad loans, large borrowers were responsible for Rs 78.2 of bad loans. This has since jumped to Rs 87.4 for every Rs 100 of bad loans.

What these numbers clearly tell us is that in a period of six months the situation has deteriorated big time and large borrowers have been responsible for it. As the RBI Financial Stability Report points out: “While adverse economic conditions and other factors related to certain specific sectors played a key role in asset quality deterioration, one of the possible inferences from the observations in this context could be that banks extended disproportionately high levels of credit to corporate entities / promoters who had much less ‘skin in the game’ during the boom period.”

What does this mean? Banks gave loans to corporates/promoters who had put very little of their own money in the project they had borrowed money for. Banks essentially gave more loans than they actually should have, given the amount of capital the promoters put in. And this is now proving to be costly for them.

In fact, lending to industry forms a major part of the stressed loans of banks. Stressed loans are essentially obtained by adding the bad loans and the restructured loans of banks.  A restructured loan is a loan on which the interest rate charged by the bank to the borrower has been lowered. Or the borrower has been given more time to repay the loan i.e. the tenure of the loan has been increased. In both cases the bank has to bear a loss.

As the RBI report points out: “Sectoral data as of June 2015 indicates that among the broad sectors, industry continued to record the highest stressed advances ratio of about 19.5 percent, followed by services at 7 per cent. The retail sector recorded the lowest stressed advances ratio at 2 per cent. In terms of size, medium and large industries each had stressed advances ratio at 21 per cent, whereas, in the case of micro industries, the ratio stood at over 8 per cent.”

Lending to the retail sector (i.e. you and me) continues to be the best form of lending for banks. The stressed loans ratio in this case is only 2%. This means that for every Rs 100 lent by banks to the retail sector (home loans, car loans, personal loans and so on), only Rs 2 is stressed.

Why is this the case? For the simple reason that it is very easy for banks to go after retail borrowers who are no longer in a position to repay the loans they have taken on. Further, there is no political meddling when it comes to loans to retail borrowers, hence, the lending is anyway of good quality.

In comparison, lending to industry has a stressed loans ratio of 19.5%. This means for every Rs 100 that the banks have lent to industry, Rs 19.5 is stressed i.e. it has either been defaulted on or has been restructured. Interestingly, even within industry, the situation with the micro industries is not as bad as the medium and the large industries.

The large industries have a stressed loans ratio of 21% i.e. for every Rs 100 lent to large industries by banks, Rs 21 has either been defaulted on or has been restructured. In case of micro industries, the number is at 8%. This is because banks can unleash their lawyers on the small industries in case the loan is in trouble. They can’t do the same on large borrowers. And even if they do it does not have the same impact.

Five sectors have been responsible for a major part of the trouble. These are mining, iron & steel, textiles, infrastructure and aviation. These “together constituted 24.2 per cent of the total advances [i.e. loans] scheduled commercial banks as of June 2015, contributed to 53.0 per cent of the total stressed advances.” “Stressed advances in the aviation sector6 increased to 61.0 per cent in June 2015 from 58.9 per cent in March, while stressed advances of the infrastructure sector increased to 24.0 per cent from 22.9 per cent during the same period.”

To conclude, when it comes to the bad loans of banking, the big boys are the bad boys who are responsible for a majority of the mess.

The column originally appeared on The Daily Reckoning on January 5, 2016

Happy new year folks: The govt has increased excise duty on petrol and diesel again!

light-diesel-oil-250x250Dear Reader,

While you, me and everybody else was busy celebrating the new year, the government quietly increased the excise duty on petrol and diesel, again. This increase was announced on January 1, 2016 and came into effect from the next day.

This is the seventh increase in the excise duty on petrol and diesel since November 2014. Also, the government has increased the excise duty thrice in quick succession over the last two months (between November 6, 2015 and now). Since November 2014, the excise duty on unbranded petrol has gone up by Rs 6.53 per litre, with latest increase being of 37 paisa per litre. This is a massive jump of 544%.

During the same period the excise duty on unbranded diesel has gone up by Rs 6.37 per litre or 436%, with the latest increase of Rs 2 per litre. In the process, the government has captured a major part of the fall in oil prices.

On November 11, 2014, when the excise duty on petrol and diesel was increased by the Narendra Modi government for the first time, the price of the Indian basket of crude oil was at $79.11 per barrel. As on December 31, 2015, the price of the Indian basket of crude oil stood at $32.9 per barrel, a massive fall of 58.4% since November 2014.

In the same period the price of petrol and diesel in Mumbai has fallen by only 3.6% and 9.9% respectively. What this tells us loud and clear is that the government has captured most of the fall in oil prices, without passing on the benefit to end consumers. The surprising thing here is that there has been no protest on this, either from the opposition parties or the citizens.

There are a number of issues that crop up here. First comes the question, why is the government doing this? In fact, there is a clear trend in the government increases of the excise duty on petrol and diesel. In 2014-2015, the last financial year, the increases came on November 11, 2014, December 2, 2014 and January 1, 2015. These increases were in the period close to the annual budget which is presented in end February.

The same trend is playing out this time as well. The three recent increases have come on November 6, 2015, December 16, 2015 and January 1, 2016. In the run up to the budget which will be presented in end February 2016, the government is sprucing up its finances. Estimates suggest that the three recent increases will bring in an extra Rs 10,000 crore into the coffers of the government.

In the budget presented in February 2015, the government had targeted a fiscal deficit of Rs 5,55,649 crore or 3.9% of the gross domestic product(GDP). Fiscal deficit is the difference between what a government earns and what it spends.

It is important to figure out how this calculation was carried out. In 2014-2015, the nominal GDP was at Rs 12,653,762 crore. Nominal GDP is essentially GDP which hasn’t been adjusted for inflation. It was assumed that during 2015-2016, the nominal GDP would increase by 11.5% to Rs 14,108,945 crore. A fiscal deficit of Rs 5,55,649 crore amounts to 3.9% of this projected GDP of Rs 14,108,945 crore.

So there are two things that the government needs to keep track of here. The absolute fiscal deficit as well as the nominal GDP. The trouble is that the nominal GDP hasn’t grown at the projected rate. The nominal GDP for the first six months of the financial year (April to September 2015) has grown by only 8.2% instead of the projected 11.5%. And this has thrown the fiscal deficit calculations of the government for a toss.

As the Mid-Year Economic Analysis released in December 2015 points out: “It is true that the decline in nominal GDP growth relative to the budget assumption will pose a challenge for meeting the fiscal deficit target of 3.9 per cent of GDP. Slower-than-anticipated nominal GDP growth (8.2 percent versus budget estimate of 11.5) will itself raise the deficit target by 0.2 percent of GDP.”

In order to ensure that it meets the fiscal deficit target, the government has increased the excise duty on petrol and diesel thrice in the last three months. On November 6, 2015, when the first of the three increases came in, the price of the Indian basket of crude oil was at $45.07 per barrel. Since then it has fallen to $32.9 per barrel, a fall of 27%. Hence, every time there has been a fall in oil prices, the government has moved in and increased the excise duty.

What this tells us is that on the finance front, the government has essentially turned out to be a one-trick pony. The easy money that the government has managed to raise from falling oil prices has led to a situation where it has totally given up on all other measures to spruce up its revenues as well as cut its expenditure.

The loss making public sector units continue to operate as they had in the past. The government continues to own stakes in companies like ITC, Axis Bank and L&T, worth thousands of crore.

The irony is that the government spends a lot of money in telling people that consumption of tobacco is injurious to health and at the same owns a 11.17% stake in ITC through the Specified Undertaking of the Unit Trust of India. How do the finance minister Arun Jaitley and prime minister Narendra Modi explain this dichotomy? (Like P Chidambaram and Manmohan Singh before them).

Jaitley has also talked about a stable tax regime in the past to woo foreign investors to invest in India. How about offering the same stable tax regime to the Indian consumer as well?

The Indian economy as well as the government finances have benefitted a lot during the course of this year due to falling oil prices. Sajjid Chinoy, chief economist at JP Morgan India, has estimated that lower oil prices gave a 1.3 percentage points boost to growth in the last four quarters.

The question is will this continue? If it doesn’t, does the government have a Plan B in place?

What will happen once oil prices start to rise? How will the government finance its expenditure? Will the government be able to maintain the excise duty that it is currently charging on petrol and diesel and allow their respective prices to rise? If the government raised excise duty in an era of falling oil prices, it is only fair that it cuts excise duty when oil prices are going up?

To conclude, falling oil prices have made the Modi government lazy on the revenue raising front. And that is clearly not a good sign as we enter 2016.

The column originally appeared on The Daily Reckoning on January 4, 2016.

Banks having a bad time, as King of Good Times celebrates his sixtieth birthday

vijay-mallya1
A few days back sections of the media reported that Vijay Mallya, a part-time businessman and a full-time defaulter of bank loans, had celebrated his sixtieth birthday by throwing a huge party at the Kingfisher Villa in Candolim, Goa.

As the Mumbai Mirror reported: “International pop icon Enrique Iglesias belted out his 2014 chartbuster ‘Bailando’ (Dancing) hours after Sonu Nigam completed a nonstop two-hour session with ‘Tum jiyo hazaron saal, saal ke din ho pachaas hazaar’.”

This is while banks wait to recover thousands of crore of loans that Mallya has defaulted on, in his quest to own and run an airline.

While Mallya and other industrialists continue to have a good time, the bad loans of banks continue piling up. The Mid-Year Economic Analysis released by the ministry of finance last week points out towards the same. As it points out: “Gross Non Performing Assets (NPAs) of scheduled commercial banks, especially Public Sector Banks (PSBs) have shown an increase during recent years.

The total bad loans (gross non-performing assets) of scheduled commercial banks increased to 5.14 % of total advances as on September 30, 2015. The number had stood at 4.6% of total advances, as on March 31, 2015. This means a jump of 54 basis points in a period of just six months. One basis point is one hundredth of a percentage.

The situation is much worse in public sector banks.  The total bad loans of public sector banks stood at 6.21% of total advances as of September 30, 2015. This number had stood at 5.43% as on March 31, 2015. This is a huge jump of 78 basis points, within a short period of six months. The number had been at 4.72% as on March 31, 2014. This tells us very clearly that the bad loans situation of public sector banks has clearly worsened.

In fact, we get the real picture if we look at the stressed assets of public sector banks. The stressed asset number is obtained by adding the bad loans and the restructured assets of a bank. A restructured asset is an asset on which the interest rate charged by the bank to the borrower has been lowered. Or the borrower has been given more time to repay the loan i.e. the tenure of the loan has been increased. In both cases the bank has to bear a loss.

The stressed assets of the public sector banks as on September 30, 2015, stood at 14.2% of the total advances. Hence, for every Rs 100 of loans given by public sector banks, Rs 14.2 are currently in dodgy territory. In March 2015, the stressed assets ratio was at 13.15%. This is a significant jump of 105 basis points. In fact, if we look at older data there are other inferences that we can draw.

In March 2011, the number was at 6.6%. In March 2012, the number grew to 8.8%. And now it stands at 14.2%. What does this tell us? It tells us very clearly that banks are increasingly restructuring more and more of their loans and pushing up the stressed asset ratio in the process. And that is not a good thing. The banks are essentially kicking the can down the road in the hope of avoiding to have to recognise bad loans as of now.

In a research note published earlier this year, Crisil Research estimates that 40% of the loans restructured during 2011-2014 have become bad loans. Morgan Stanley estimates that 65% of restructured loans will turn bad in the time to come. What this tells us very clearly tells us that a major portion of stressed assets are essentially restructured loans which haven’t been recognised as bad loans.

This clearly tells us that the balance sheets of public sector banks continue to remain stressed. Data from the Indian Banks’ Association shows that the public sector banks own a total of 77.4% of assets of the total banking system. This means they dominate the system. And if their balance sheets are in a bad shape it is but natural that they will go slow on giving ‘new’ loans. As the latest RBI Annual Report points out: “Private sector banks with lower NPA ratios, posted higher credit growth …At the aggregate level, the NPA ratio and credit growth exhibited a statistically significant negative correlation of 0.8, based on quarterly data since 2010-11.”
As the accompanying chart clearly points out the loan growth of private sector banks which have a lower amount of stressed assets has been much faster than that of public sector banks.
Source: RBI Annual Report

Also, it is worth asking here why are public sector banks continuing to pile up bad loans. The answer might perhaps lie in the fact that the interest paying capacity and the principal repaying capacity of corporates who have taken on these loans continues to remain weak. As the Mid-Year Economic Review points out: “Corporate balance sheets remain highly stressed. According to analysis done by Credit Suisse, for non – financial corporate sector (based on ~ 11000 companies in the CMIE database as of FY2014 and projections done for FY2015 based on a sample of 3700 companies), the number of companies whose interest cover is less than 1 has not declined significantly (this number was 1003 in September 2014 and is 994 in September 2015 quarter).”

Interest coverage ratio is arrived at by dividing the operating profit (earnings before interest and taxes) of a company by the total amount of interest that a company needs to pay on what it has borrowed during a given period. An interest coverage ratio of less than one, as is the case with many companies in the Credit Suisse sample, essentially means that the companies are not making enough money to even be able to pay interest on their borrowings.

Further, “the weighted average interest cover ratio has declined from 2.5 in September 2014 to 2.3 in September 2015 (research indicates that an interest cover of below 2.5 for larger companies and below 4 for smaller companies is considered below investment grade).

Given this, it is not surprising that bad loans of banks continue to pile up, while guys like Mallya continue to have a “good time”.

Postscript: I will be taking a break from writing The Daily Reckoning for the next few days. Will see you again in the new year. Here is wishing you a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year.

The column originally appeared on The Daily Reckoning on December 24, 2015

Arun Jaitley will abandon fiscal consolidation in next year’s budget

Fostering Public Leadership - World Economic Forum - India Economic Summit 2010
It’s too early to be writing about the next year’s budget as it’s more than two months away. But given the way things stand as of now a few things can be safely said.

The finance minister Arun Jaitley during the course of the budget speech in February earlier this year, had said: “I want to underscore that my government still remains firm on achieving the medium term target of 3% of GDP…I will complete the journey to a fiscal deficit of 3% in 3 years, rather than the two years envisaged previously.  Thus, for the next three years, my targets are: 3.9%, for 2015-16; 3.5% for 2016-17; and, 3.0% for 2017-18.” Fiscal deficit is essentially the difference between what a government earns and what it spends.

The way things stand as of now there is no way that the finance minister can work with a fiscal deficit target of 3.5% of the gross domestic product(GDP) for 2016-2017, which is the next financial year.

Why do I say that? The Mid-Year Economic Analysis released by the ministry of finance last week hints towards the same. The nominal GDP growth for the first six months of the year came in only at 8.2%. It had been assumed to grow at 11.5% in the budget. Nominal GDP is essentially GDP which hasn’t been adjusted for inflation.

This lower than expected economic growth has led to the ministry revising the expected nominal growth for 2015-2016 to 8.2%. “Unless oil prices decline further this annual estimate of 8.2 percent would represent two successive years of substantial declines in nominal GDP growth…We estimate that real GDP for the year as a whole will lie in the 7-7.5 per cent range.,” the Mid-Year Economic Review pointed out. The real GDP is essentially GDP which has been adjusted for inflation.

In this scenario of lower than expected economic growth (as measured by the real/nominal GDP growth) “if the government sticks to the path for fiscal consolidation, that would further detract from demand,” the Review points out. Further, “consolidation of the magnitude contemplated by the government… could weaken a softening economy”. Fiscal consolidation is essentially the reduction of fiscal deficit, along the lines Jaitley had talked about in his budget speech.

What the Review is essentially saying here is that if the government continues to cut its fiscal deficit, it will have to cut down on its expenditure. And in an environment where the consumer and industrial demand isn’t really robust this may not be the best way to go about it. With overall demand not in best shape if the government also cuts its expenditure there will be a further fall in demand and in the process economic growth will slow down further.

Hence, enough hints have been dropped in the Mid-Year Economic Review to suggest that the government doesn’t plan to stick to the fiscal deficit target of 3.5% of the GDP in 2016-2017, as it had talked about at the time it presented the budget for 2015-2016.

In fact, even without taking what the Mid-Year Economic Review has to say, the numbers clearly suggest that there is no way the government can work with a fiscal deficit target of 3.5% of the GDP.

The recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission are expected to add Rs 73,650 crore or 0.65% of the GDP in the first year, to the government’s expenditure. In line with the recommendations of the Commission, the government will pay higher salaries as well as pensions.

Also, the recommendations of the Commission come into effect from January 1, 2016.  They will be implemented from April 1, 2016. Hence, arrears for the three months of January to March 2016 will also have to be paid. This is likely to amount to Rs 18,412.5 crore (Rs 73,650 divided by 4). This pushes up the total extra expenditure due to the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission to Rs 92,062.5 crore (Rs 73,650 crore plus Rs 18,412.5 crore).

Over and above this, The Financial Express reports that the Railways has requested the government to fund the extra money it would have to spend in order to meet the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission. This is estimated to be Rs 28,450 crore. The Pay Commission in its reports expected the Railways to meet this extra expenditure out of its own revenues. But with the revenues of the Railways not growing as fast as they were expected to, this may not happen now.

Further, arrears of the first three months of 2016 will also have to be paid by the Railways and this will push the total extra expenditure of the Railways to be funded by the government to Rs 35,562.5 crore (Rs 28,450 crore plus Rs28,450 crore divided by 4).

Hence, the total extra expenditure of the government due to the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission will come to Rs 1,27,625 crore (Rs 92,062.5 crore plus Rs 35,562.5 crore). Add to this the extra expenditure due to the implementation of one rank one pension which is expected to come to Rs 10,000 crore and we are looking at an extra expenditure of close to Rs 1,40,000 crore.

Also, as I had pointed out in yesterday’s column food and fertilizer subsidies of greater than Rs 1,00,000 crore have not been paid. Once all these factors are taken into account it becomes very clear that there is no way the government can come up with a fiscal deficit number of 3.5% of the GDP.

So, what is the solution for the government, given that this is big money being talked about here? Rest assured some accounting shenanigans will be resorted to with some expenditures (like the payment of subsidies) being postponed. Over and above this, the government needs to shut down loss making public sector enterprises and sell the assets these public sector enterprises have been sitting on for many years now.

The Business Standard reports that the government is planning to raise the rate of service tax from the current 14% to 16%. This is line with the recommendations of the Arvind Subramnian committee which has proposed a standard goods and services tax in the range of 16.9-18.9%. As an editorial in The Financial Express points out: “Based on this year’s budgeted collections for service taxes, a 2-percentage-point hike can yield around R30,000-35,000 crore extra.” And this clearly won’t be enough.

The column was originally published in The Daily Reckoning on December 23, 2015

Mr Jaitley, what is India’s ‘real’ fiscal deficit?

Fostering Public Leadership - World Economic Forum - India Economic Summit 2010
The ministry of finance released the Mid-Year Economic Analysis for 2015-2016(April 2015 to March 2016) last week. One of the worrying things that it pointed out in the report was regarding India’s fiscal deficit. Fiscal deficit is the difference between what a government earns and what it spends.

In the annual budget for 2015-2016, it was projected that the fiscal deficit for the year would work out to Rs 5,55,649 crore or 3.9% of the gross domestic product (GDP). From the way things stand as of now it is highly unlikely that this number will be achieved.

Why is that? It is all about the way the GDP number has been calculated. When the government says that it expects the fiscal deficit to be at 3.9% of the GDP, it is talking about the GDP in nominal terms. Nominal GDP is essentially GDP which hasn’t been adjusted for inflation. The GDP for 2015-2016 has been projected at Rs 14,108,945 crore by assuming an 11.5% growth over the GDP of Rs 12,653,762 crore for 2014-2015 (April 2014 to March 2015).

Hence, the projected fiscal deficit of Rs 5,55,649 crore expressed as a proportion of the projected nominal GDP of Rs 14,108,945 crore is 3.9%. So far so good.
The trouble is that 11.5% growth is turning out to be an extremely optimistic assumption. The Mid-Year Economic Analysis points out that the GDP growth during the first six months of 2015-2016, has been at 8.2% instead of the assumed 11.5%. And this is a huge gap.

If the GDP is to grow by 11.2% during the course of the year, then it needs to grow by 13.6% during the second half of the year. i.e. between October 2015 and March 2016.

The way things stand as of now that seems highly unlikely. So how will the fiscal deficit look if the GDP grows by only 8.2% during the course of the year? In that case, the fiscal deficit will work out to 4.1% of the GDP, assuming that the absolute number of Rs 5,55,649 crore, does not change. Hence, the fiscal deficit will see a jump of 20 basis points from the expected 3.9% to the actual 4.1%. One basis point equals one hundredth of a percentage.

As the Mid-Year Economic Analysis points out: “It is true that the decline in nominal GDP growth relative to the budget assumption will pose a challenge for meeting the fiscal deficit target of 3.9 per cent of GDP. Slower-than-anticipated nominal GDP growth (8.2 percent versus budget estimate of 11.5) will itself raise the deficit target by 0.2 percent of GDP. The anticipated shortfall in disinvestment receipts, owing to adverse market conditions for a portfolio that largely comprises commodity stocks, will add to the challenge.”

So how does the government plan to tackle this challenge? As the Mid-Year Economic Analysis points out: “Tax collections have been buoyant. That plus the additional revenue measures (the Swachh Bharat cess and recent increases in excise) will ensure that central government’s target will be met.”

Last week the government raised the excise duty on petrol and diesel again by Rs 0.30 per litre and Rs 1.17 per litre respectively. This will add Rs 2,500 crore to the government kitty during the remaining part of the year. The total excise duty on petrol and diesel currently stands at Rs 19.36 and Rs 11.83 per litre.

Excise duty on diesel and petrol has been a major source of finance for the government. As Harsh Damodaran writes in The Indian Express: “Since June 2014, the specific excise duty on diesel has been hiked from Rs 3.56 to Rs 11.83 per litre, and from Rs 9.48 to Rs 19.36 per litre for petrol. The annual revenue gain to it from these increases would add up to Rs 95,000 crore or so — Rs 68,000 crore from diesel, and Rs 27,000 crore from petrol.” The excise duty has been hiked seven times since November 2014.

Getting back to the fiscal deficit—it is more than likely that the government will meet the fiscal deficit target of 3.9% of the GDP. This will be achieved through higher excise duty collections. Don’t be surprised if the excise duty on petrol and diesel is increased further, if the price of oil falls any further (let’s say it goes below $30 per barrel). Along with that some expenditure cuts will also have to be made. As the Mid-Year Economic Analysis points out: “If the typical pattern of revenue collection and spending is taken into account, the first half outturn is well in line with meeting the year’s target.”

Nevertheless, it needs to be pointed out here that the government has been postponing the payment of fertilizer as well as food subsidies. As the economist Ashok Gulati writes in The Indian Express: “Fertiliser policy is in a mess. Unpaid fertiliser subsidy bills to the industry have crossed Rs 40,000 crore, and will likely reach Rs 48,000 crore by the end of this fiscal year, as per industry estimates…The finance minister may be smart enough to show that the fiscal deficit is under control, but unpaid fertiliser and food subsidy bills have together already crossed Rs 1,00,000 crore.”

Over and above this, a report in The Financial Express points out that the unpaid subsidy of the Food Corporation of India (FCI) was at an all-time high of Rs 73,650 crore as of March 2015. What this tells us very clearly is that the fiscal deficit number of 3.9% of the GDP is incorrect. It has been achieved by the government postponing the payment of subsidies.

This is not a good practice given that the aim of any accounting should be to put forward the correct financial picture. By postponing the payment of bills, the government beats that very purpose.

It needs to be pointed out here that this isn’t something that the Narendra Modi government started. It was something that they have inherited from the previous Congress led United Progressive Alliance government.

Having said that it is now their problem and it needs to be tackled, instead of just being postponed. As Gulati writes: “Clear the arrears…If not in one go, the finance minister could commit to doing this over two years. Blaming the previous government for the mess will not help.

Indeed, that is a sensible suggestion which the finance minister Arun Jaitley should implement when he presents the next budget in February 2016. Also, a part of the finance for these payments could be raised through shutting of loss making public sector enterprises and selling off their assets (primarily land in cities which is in perennial short supply).

The question is will Jaitley choose to clean up the government accounts or postpone the problem again? My bet is on the latter. How about yours?

The column originally appeared on The Daily Reckoning on December 22, 2015