The interesting thing is that not a single public sector bank is in loss now.

Winning Bizness Desk

Mumbai - Achche Din (Good days) for public sector banks are back. In the three quarters of the current financial year i.e. from April 2021 to December, all banks have earned a total profit of Rs 48,874 crore. The interesting thing is that not a single public sector bank is in loss now. The government told Parliament that between April and December, no public sector bank has suffered losses.

What State Finance Minister said in Parliament

State Finance Minister Bhagwat Karad said in the Rajya Sabha that in 2020-21, public sector banks had earned a total profit of Rs 31,820 crore. However, from 2015-16 to 2019-20, many public sector banks were in loss. The total loss of these banks was Rs 85,370 crore in 2017-18, which came down to Rs 66,636 crore in 2018-19.

Suffered loss in last few years

In 2019-20, these banks suffered a loss of Rs 25,941 crore while in 2015-16 their loss was Rs 17,993 crore. In 2016-17, they had a loss of Rs 11,389 crore. During the financial years 2009-10 to 2014-15, public sector banks were profitable. The total number of branches of these banks increased from 58,653 to 84,694 during 31 March 2010 to 31 March 2021. In this, the number of branches in metropolitan areas increased from 13,596 to 16,369 while in semi-urban areas from 14,959 to 23,347.

12 public sector banks

Notably, there are a total of 12 government banks in the country. The largest banks in this are State Bank of India (SBI), Punjab National Bank (PNB), Union Bank of India and Bank of Baroda. Out of this, four banks are ready to be merged with other banks.