RBI should roll back steps after rupee stabilises: SBI

New Delhi, July 16: Bankers today said that the liquidity tightening measures announced by RBI are temporary and hoped that they will be rolled back once the rupee stabilises. “These measures are temporary, to calm down volatility. We are not taking that these measures will be long-term. I think once the rupee stabilises, these steps should be largely rolled back,” SBI Chairman Pratip Chaudhuri said.

The Reserve Bank of India had last night announced a slew of measures like raising the cost of borrowing by banks by 2 per cent to 10.25 per cent and announcing sale of bonds worth Rs 12,000 crore through open market operations to suck liquidity to check the rupee slide. The rupee had earlier this month touched a life-time low of 61.21 to a dollar. On the impact of RBI measures on interest rates, Chaudhuri said: “Impact on loan growth depends on how long these measures stay. Deposit rates do not have such a close correlation with the money market.’’ RBI’s measures strengthened the rupee to 59.20 against the dollar in noon trade against the previous close of 59.89.

“RBI action is towards the forex side of market and to contain volatility in rupee,” Bank of Baroda Chairman S.S. Mundra said, adding that it would be too early for RBI to change the policy stance. RBI is scheduled to announce its first quarter monetary policy review on July 30. UCO Bank Chairman Arun Kaul said RBI’s step is a temporary measure and the bank has to wait for some more time to decide on the impact of this move. “The objective of RBI action is to compress liquidity. The implications are same as repo rate hike. RBI has opted for that time which is slack in terms of credit demand,” Kaul said.

No pressure from government to cut rates: Pratip Chaudhuri

Mumbai, September 7: In an interview with ET Now, Pratip Chaudhuri, chairman, SBI, talks about the rationale behind their decision to cut rates as well as credit growth targets and the expected NPA levels in Q2. Edited excerpts:
ET Now: Take us through the rationale behind your decision to cut deposit rate.
Pratip Chaudhuri: Yes. Our deposit growth has been very robust from April 1 to August 31. The deposits have grown by Rs 75,000 crore and the loan growth, including commercial paper, has been only Rs 30,000 crore. Therefore, we thought we will try to restrict and moderate our deposit growth.
ET Now: Are PSU banks cutting rates under pressure from the government even though SBI has been the first to do so?
Pratip Chaudhuri: We don't cut rates because of pressure from the government. PSU banks decide their rates on their own. But while deciding the rate, one has to look at the market and the relative positioning of the bank. We adjust the rate looking at the demand. For example, in our case, we reduced the car and home loan rates thinking that the reduction would allow growth in the loan book for cars and homes.
ET Now: But many banks have revised their credit growth targets in light of low demand. Is there is a similar thought at SBI as well?
Pratip Chaudhuri: These targets are not our own. The targets are largely determined and shaped by the volumes you see. It is very easy to move the credit growth target up, but where are the deposits? Similarly, if you get more deposits and there is not enough traction in the credit market, then you have to calibrate it down. Therefore, it is always a function of demand and supply. And I do not think the individual target-settings by banks are anyway meaningful.
ET Now: What kind of loan growth are you seeing and sectors will drive this demand?
Pratip Chaudhuri: For our bank, the biggest contributor has been the construction sector, particularly the contracting firms and companies which are doing work for state government agencies. Next are the electrical machinery and the power sector which are selling their produce to the distribution companies. These have been the two biggest sectors.
There was some worry on the iron and steel front because there were problems as far as iron ore mining and availability of iron ore is concerned. The iron ore mining situation is becoming slightly better. Therefore, we expect the steel sector's raw material availability to rise and their finances to improve as well.
ET Now: Tell us about your asset quality, especially in terms of the power, iron and steel sectors. Which sectors are likely to be the biggest contributors to your NPA situation?
Pratip Chaudhuri: The levels can be known with some degree of accuracy only by the 20th or 25th of the month following the quarter, but we are working hard to control these levels.
ET Now: What kind of NPA levels are you expecting in Q2?
Pratip Chaudhuri: Restructuring pipeline is not very different from the delinquent pipeline. Therefore, for companies that are under stress but have real value asset and want to borrow against that, we are considering extending the tenure of the loans or making available more loans.
ET Now: What is the extent of restructuring that you are expecting in the second quarter? Tell us what the pipeline is looking like.
Pratip Chaudhuri: Under the SBI Act, the minimum government holding has to be 51%. Therefore, I do not think it is right for me to comment because the government's holding percentage has to be determined by the government. I can only tell you that the government has left no stone unturned in capitalising the public sector banks. Last year, they pumped in about Rs 15,000 to 20,000 crore of equity to keep the pubic sector banks well capitalised.
Therefore, I do not think anybody should doubt the commitment and ability of the government to keep the banks well capitalised. But at the same time it is important that the banks generate sufficiently large internal surpluses.

Pratip Chaudhuri said lateral recruitment has to be done with a lot of care

Mumbai, September 4: State Bank of India Chairman Pratip Chaudhuri on Monday said that lateral hiring in banks had led to frustration among existing employees.
Speaking at the curtain-raiser of the Ficci Banking Conclave, Chaudhuri said, “A high degree of lateral recruitment brings disappointment and frustration to the existing cadre and they end up saying ‘what was our fault’.”
Chaudhuri said lateral recruitment has to be done with a lot of care. In addition, he said, lateral recruitment done by some banks at general manager level, except in specialist positions such as economists or law, has not worked out well.
For SBI, Chaudhuri said, there is very little lateral recruitment, and attrition is at the end of career span (after 30-35 years).
Talking about banking in rural areas, he was of the view that employees are not ready to relocate to rural areas. “Mostly what happens is that if you say that an employee is posted at Mumbai, he/she is very happy. But the day you tell them that you have to relocate to Surat or Nashik, that is when attrition happens.”
As a solution to this issue and to boost financial inclusion, Chaudhuri suggested that banks change the way they compensate people. He explained that the compensation structure of any employee was biased in favour of metros.
“I think we need to have a reverse compensation.
There should be a compensation to work in rural, semi-urban areas. In the next wage revision with the Indian Banks’ Association, this would one of the things (that would be addressed),” he added.

Chakrabarty frowns at SBI chief’s views on CRR phase-out

Chennai, Aug. 27: The Reserve Bank of India Deputy Governor, K. C. Chakrabarty, came down heavily on State Bank of India Chairman Pratip Chaudhuri’s views seeking the phase out of the cash reserve ratio (CRR), saying either comply or do business elsewhere.
Responding to a question, on the sidelines of a financial conference on systemic risk organised here on Monday by the Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chakrabarty said banks must work within the framework prescribed by the regulator. “If the SBI Chairman is not able to do the business in this regulatory environment, he has to find out some other place,” he said.
CRR is the percentage of deposits commercial banks keep with the central bank.
Pratip Chaudhuri recently said that CRR does not help anybody. “When CRR is not applicable to insurance companies, non-banking finance companies and mutual funds that also mobilise funds from the public, it is an unfair imposition on banks,” he said to make a point that the CRR adds to the cost of doing business for banks.

SBI management mulling working Sundays to improve efficiency

Mumbai: Country's largest lender State Bank of India may have its branches open on Sundays to help improve efficiency, a top bank official has said.
"Possibly we would like to see Sunday working which would increase the time available for doing banking and increase the business," bank chairman Pratip Chaudhuri told analysts on a conference call organised by the brokerage Edelweiss Securities.
The bank had last year taken everybody by surprise by opting to keep all its branches open on October 2 to compensate for a day's business loss due to a technical snag.
The bank management was happy with the foot falls and the staff turnout at the branches at that time in spite of it being a Sunday as well as a national holiday - Gandhi Jayanti.
Notably, many private banks, which control only a minority share in the banking operations, do keep their select branches open on Sundays for customer convenience, even though technologies like internet banking have reduced the need.
Being open on Sundays is said to help the branches attract the new-age working class customers where both the spouses in a household work and struggle to do banking transactions during the week.
SBI, which has almost 14,000 branches across the country, counts on its large chunk of savings account deposits (at over 38 percent) for higher margins.
However, if such a move were to be made, it would be interesting how the bank unions, which had crippled banking operations across country last week protesting reform measures, take to such a proposal.
SBI had carried out widely appreciated 'Parivartan' programme in early part of this decade, which helped it stay relevant in changing times and maintaining lead in the market.
During the call, Chaudhuri said the costs incurred on developing physical infrastructure and network does not hit the bank as much as staff costs.
In order to improve efficiency, it will therefore try to delegate routine responsibilities currently done by officers to the low cost junior employees, he said.

Rs 4,000-cr capital infusion on cards: SBI chief

State Bank of India expects Rs 4,000 crore capital infusion from the Union Government this fiscal. The bank will be discussing the matter with the Government this week, said Pratip Chaudhuri, Chairman, SBI.
The bank had earlier this year received close to Rs 8,000 crore from the Government.
“They (the Government) have called us for a meeting which should happen this week, and possibly another Rs 4,000 crore looks to be on the horizon,” he said.
As on June 30, 2012, the bank’s capital adequacy ratio stood at 13.17 per cent.
Non-performing assets
According to Chaudhuri, NPA (non-performing asset) concerns were slightly overplayed. “We should not see ghosts in NPAs,” he said, and added SBI has already taken several measures to bring down its NPAs.
“We are asking companies having non-core assets to sell them and bring the cash. If the company is short of capital, we are asking them to get some private equity or get equity investors, and if the company is asset free and cash poor, we are positioning more loans,” he said.
Recently, SBI appointed 20 credit appraisal experts from leading public sector companies to deal with the technical aspects of its new projects.

SBI chief wants NPA rules tweaked

Kolkata, August 23: State Bank of India (SBI) chairman has called for a change in non-performing assets’ (NPAs) norms. “There is a need to change the norms relating to NPAs. We should not see a ghost in everything,” said Pratip Chaudhuri.
“For instance, a company has taken a two-year loan to install a machinery. If it fails to repay in two years, just because the repayment has been stretched beyond its original schedule, we should not consider it as an NPA. Nowhere in the world such a yardstick is applied. We need to see if the machinery equipment is sound and capable of generating good output.” The bank chief made these comments to reporters on the sidelines of a banking seminar organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
The country’s largest commercial bank saw a surge in bad loans in the first three months of this financial year. The bank added close to Rs 7,500 crore of bad loans on a gross basis during the quarter, prompting investors to sell its shares. Its gross NPA ratio was at 4.99 per cent, while net NPA ratio was at 2.22 per cent at the end of June 2012.
Chaudhuri also said concerns over SBI’s credit quality was “largely overplayed” and the bank will see an improvement in the health of its assets from the July-September quarter. “Our quarterly profit was more than most public sector enterprises’ but our stock got a huge battering because of our NPA. We have done an analysis of the situation. NPAs are largely in the mid-corporate and SME sectors. But with a little consideration, a little understanding and stretching the repayment period, most of these accounts can be upgraded,” Chaudhuri said.
The chairman of the banking behemoth said there would soon be an improvement in the NPA numbers. “We accept the reality, but still, I think, NPA concerns are largely overplayed. In the next two to three quarters, our NPA management will be much better. Current trends do not indicate any increase in our NPAs. In fact, there could be a contraction in our NPAs in this quarter,” he added.
The bank has asked some of its borrowers to sell non-core assets to improve cash flow. If a company is short of capital, SBI is ensuring that the firm takes steps to strengthen its capital base. “If the company is asset-rich but cash-poor, we are positioning more loans to them,” said Chaudhuri. SBI has also appointed 20 senior executives from various public sector enterprises to review the technical aspects of industrial projects before sanctioning fresh loans against them.

State Bank of India maintains margin guidance of 3.75%

Mumbai, August 13: In an interview to CNBC-TV18, Pratip Chaudhuri,  Chairman of State Bank of India says, 9% of total midcap book of Rs 1.75 lakh crore is NPA. The bank maintains its margin guidance of 3.75%. State Bank of India‘s first quarter results disappointed the street. While net profit jumped 136% year-on-year to Rs 3,752 crore, investors were unnerved by the steep rise in non-performing assets. The bank’s net interest income for the quarter rose 14.6% to Rs 11,119 crore, as a 23% rise in borrowing costs ate into the profit margins. The bank’s operating income rose 10.5% year-on-year and operating profit, 13%.

The bank’s net NPA rose to 2.22% from 1.82% quarter-on-year. The bank maintains its margin guidance of 3.75% and Chaudhuri explains, “It’s a slightly fluctuating game, but I do not think there is still possibility of it dropping very substantially. It would not. This is the bottom and we maintain 3.75% guidance because what is core to our margin is our ability to procure savings bank account at an optimum price.” Going forward, he expects the credit growth to come mainly from the retail sector. Here is the edited transcript of the interview on CNBC-TV18.

SBI's sharp downturn NPAs increase, but provisioning does not

The performance of the State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, is in a way similar to that of the Indian Railways. Both, because of their size and critical positioning, are significantly linked to the overall health of the economy. It is, therefore, not surprising that in the first quarter of the current year the bank has reported a sharp rise in non-performing assets (NPA), indicating borrowers’ inability to service their loans in the present economic environment. This has overshadowed the large year-on-year rise in the bottom line, which has, in any case, benefited from the earlier low base then caused by catching up in provisioning. The bank’s Chairman, Pratip Chaudhuri, has highlighted the deterioration in the portfolio for mid-corporates and small and medium enterprises, which underlines the adverse conditions at the grassroots level. The agricultural and large account portfolios have also deteriorated, but Mr Chaudhuri has held out the hope that with the monsoon picking up somewhat and a chance of two large loans getting back on track, the outlook may not be all that depressing.

What cannot, however, be explained by the overall deterioration in the economic situation, which has been gradual, is the sharp setback in performance compared to the picture it had projected just three months ago. In the last quarter of 2011-12, gross NPAs had actually fallen by a small amount, compared to the sequential previous quarter. This had been made possible by upgrading of assets, more cash recoveries and low additions to non-performing assets. The hope that the bank would be able to sustain this effort in order to combat the tough year that lay ahead has been belied. Gross NPAs have gone up by a massive nearly Rs 7,500 crore and taken the ratio of gross NPA to total assets up to 4.99 per cent from 4.44 per cent. There has also been a sequential deterioration in performance across the board covering interest income, net interest margin (down by 28 basis points), other income and operating profit. Poorer operating performance, combined with higher provisioning, has led to a fall in return on assets by 12 basis points to touch 1.03 per cent.

If non-performing assets have gone up sharply then so should provisioning. However, quite perplexingly, provisioning on that account has actually gone down marginally. This amounts to making the bottom line look better than it actually is. The bank may have good reason to believe that by the end of the financial year improvement will be made in asset quality, but it is always better to first provide and then write back if you get the chance to. After Mr Chaudhuri took over, he earned appreciation by cleaning up the balance sheet and then posting improved performance. That is the trend that needed to continue.

State Bank of India: Net Profit Increased to Rs 3,752 crore

Mumbai, August 10: State Bank of India reported a 137 per cent jump in net profit in the April-June quarter despite continued challenge on the bad loans front. In the reporting quarter, India’s biggest bank clocked a net profit of Rs 3,752 crore compared with Rs 1583 crore in the year ago period.

Tight leash on operating expenses (up by 7.5 per cent at Rs 6,441 crore) and write-back in investment depreciation (Rs 521 crore, due to favourable interest rate movement) boosted the bank’s profitability. According to Pratip Chaudhuri, Chairman, SBI, “Our earnings have stabilised and this has become a new normal for SBI. This is in spite of the fact that provisioning has been a little higher than normally what we do. But we did not have to skimp on the provisioning.”

He pointed out that the challenge for the bank is on the bad loans front. During the reporting quarter, the gross and net non-performing loans increased by about Rs 7,500 crore and Rs 4500 crore, respectively. “In terms of NPA by sector, we have been able to contain the increase in NPAs in the large corporate book. But what has proved to be our nemesis is the increase in NPAs in the mid-corporates, particularly in the SME segment,” the SBI chief said.

Though the net interest margin (the ratio of net interest income to earning assets) was a tad lower at 3.57 per cent (3.62 per cent in the year-ago period), the bank has maintained its guidance of 3.75 per cent for FY13. Due to stress in the mid-corporate and small and medium enterprise segments, SBI will focus on segments such as home and car loans and large corporate loans to boost credit growth.

Trying to increase coverage in retail space: Pratip Chaudhuri

Mumbai, August 2: In an interview with ET Now, Pratip Chaudhuri, Chairman of State Bank of India, gives his views on the RBI monetary policy and rate cuts. Excerpts:

 

ET Now: Firstly, how much of a benefit will SBI get from the cut in SLR announced by the RBI in this policy?

 

Pratip Chaudhuri: We thank the RBI. The policy had become two-dimensional. People used to only talk about the repo rate and a possible CRR cut. But the RBI added a third dimension of injecting liquidity beyond these two instruments, i.e. repo rate and CRR cut. Last time they increased the refinance component on export credit from 15% to 50%. This has given us an additional Rs 5000 crore.

 

The SLR cut has released about Rs 10000 crore for SBI. So what it means to my mind is that Rs 10000 crore which was locked up in low-yield SLR security, we would have greater urgency to deploy that in productive sectors.

 

ET Now: How much is your present SLR holding and would you look at taking benefit of the SLR reduction limit which was announced by the Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday?

 

Pratip Chaudhuri: Our SLR holding is currently about 28%. With this 1% reduction, it would become about 4% surplus. So you can either sell, depending on where that particular scrip is trading. Even if you don't sell, you can always put it into LAF and get liquidity. So roughly we have Rs 40000 crore of extra liquidity.

 

ET Now: Is the cut in your base rates as well in the pipeline then?

 

Pratip Chaudhuri: Not a broad-base rate cut. Only car loan and home loans are being targeted because we think that the instrument of interest rate should be used for increasing the credit flow.

 

So we think that the impact of cutting interest rates would be highest in these 2 segments -- home and car loans. No matter what is the interest rate for the corporate sector, there is hardly any demand for term loans. Working capital loans are also not in high demand because currently the commercial papers are going at about 9.3 to 9.7, which is below the base rates of all banks. So we are trying to increase our coverage in the retail space.

SBI cuts interest rates on Home & Car loans from August 7

Mumbai, August 1: The country's largest lender State Bank of India will cut rates on its home and auto loans. The move comes close on the heels of the Reserve Bank of India cutting the statutory liquidity ratio for banks in its policy statement on Tuesday.

 

SBI will cut rates on home loans by 25 bps and on auto loans by 50 bps, the bank's chairman Pratip Chaudhuri told ET NOW in an exclusive interview. The new rates will be effective from August 7. The bank, however, is not in a position to cut its base rate at present.

 

"We need to use interest rates as an instrument to increase credit flow. We are targeting home and auto loans because the pass through in both these segments will be the fastest," Mr Chaudhuri said. SBI's asset liability committee met on Wednesday evening to take a call on interest rates following the RBI's policy.

 

According to Mr Chaudhuri, "there is very weak corporate demand and it won't make business sense to cut rates for corporates at this juncture." However, he added that a pick-up in demand from corporates may lead to the bank looking at reducing rates for corporates.

 

SBI has in the recent past cut rates on its SME and auto loan portfolios but this is the first home loan rate cut by the bank in a few quarters.

 

Though the bank hasn't taken any call on deposit rates yet, Mr Chaudhuri mentioned that SBI is seeing a surfeit of deposits at a time when the rest of the banking industry is starved of deposits. The bank will declare its Q1 earnings on August 10.

 

PTI Reports:  New Delhi, August 1: State Bank of India today slashed lending rates on car and home loans by up to 0.5 per cent, a day after one per cent cut in SLR by the Reserve Bank. SBI has reduced interest rate on home loans of up to Rs 30 lakh to 10.25 per cent from existing 10.50 per cent (after 0.25 per cent concession over the card rate), a senior bank official said.

 

On the home loans of beyond Rs 30 lakh but less than Rs 75 lakh, the new rate will be 10.40 per cent against the existing 10.75 per cent, down 0.35 per cent.

 

The new rates will be effective from August 7, the official added. The base rate or minimum lending rate of SBI stands at 10 per cent. Base rate is the benchmark rate below which a bank cannot lend.

 

With regard to the car loan, the reduction is to the extent of 0.5 per cent. The new car loan would be 10.75 per cent against the existing rate of 11.25 per cent for a seven-year loan. Now for every Rs 1 lakh, a customer has to pay Rs 1,699 EMI against Rs 1,725 per month earlier. SBI claimed this as the lowest EMI. With the reduction, a borrower would end up saving Rs 312 per year on every one lakh.

 

Yesterday, RBI in its quarterly monetary policy review reduced Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR), the amount of deposits that have to be invested in government bonds and other liquid assets, by 1 per cent. RBI Governor D Subbarao cut the SLR to 23 per cent, thereby releasing around Rs 68,000 crore of additional liquidity into the system, even as he left all the key interest rates unchanged in the anti-inflationary stance.

SLR cut may help slash lending rates: Bankers

Mumbai, July 31 The Reserve Bank of India has done a balancing act amid weak economic conditions by increasing liquidity that can help bankers cut lending rates, and at the same time let it continue with its nearly three-year-old fight against inflation, top lenders said Tuesday.

They hinted at a marginal reduction in lending rates following today’s cut in the statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) — the amount of deposits that have to be invested in government bonds and other liquid assets. The central bank reduced the SLR by 1% at the quarterly monetary policy review on Tuesday morning.

India’s largest lender, State Bank of India, hinted at lowering lending rates to retail customers. “The one percentage point cut in SLR will release an additional Rs 10,000 crore for SBI. That coupled with Rs 6,500 crore released through the reduction in export refinance, may lead the bank to cut lending rates in retail,” SBI chairman Pratip...

SBI expects 50 bps cut in CRR, no change in lending rate

India's largest lender State Bank today said it expects Reserve Bank to lower the mandatory cash reserve requirement of banks or CRR by 50 basis points on July 31 but sees no reduction in the key short-term lending rate.

 "We expect a 0.5 percentage point reduction in CRR (the percentage of deposits that banks park with the RBI) to ease money supply. Also, this will have better effect on monetary transmission than a reduction in the short-term lending rate," SBI Chairman Pratip Chaudhuri told reporters after announcing the successful conclusion of a USD 1.25 billion overseas bond sale.

 RBI will announce its first quarter monetary policy review on Tuesday in the backdrop of slowing growth, poor investment sentiment and persistently high inflation.

Yesterday, SBI had closed a mid-term note or bond issue at a coupon of 4.12%, making it the largest and cheapest bond sale by a domestic lender till date. Chaudhuri said the asset quality of the Government-run
bank has improving compared to last year. He did not give any further details citing a silent period ahead of the earnings.

 The bank will announce its April-June quarterly earnings on August 8. The comments came after SBI shares slumped as much as 3.8% today as a rise in non-performing assets at Punjab National Bank and Union Bank of India sparked concerns about asset quality in the Government-run lenders.

 Explaining the rationale behind why a CRR cut is better at this juncture, Chaudhuri said this will help bank's liquidity, which in turn, will help them lower the lending rates, thus helping the monetary transmission better.

On the contrary, he said a marginal reduction in the repo will not help banks to cut lending rates.The senior unsecured dollar bond issue, due in August 2017, was carried through the London branch of SBI. The issue was rated Baa2 by Moody's and BBB- by S&P.

Deficit monsoon to impact loan re-payment: SBI chief

Amid concerns over rising bad loans, SBI today sounded a note of caution saying that failure of monsoon will not only affect the economy but also banks as re-paying capacity of borrowers will come under pressure.

In view of the deficit monsoon rain, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has already directed all departments and ministries to coordinate with states to meet any eventuality by monitoring the situation on a weekly basis.

"If the monsoon fail it will (have) a cascading impact on credit growth as well as the economy which in turn will impact the re-paying capacity of borrowers," SBI chairman Pratip Chaudhuri told reporters in Mumbai.

He further said the State Bank of India (SBI) will assess the impact of monsoon after August 10 when the situation will become more clear.

Speaking on the impact of monsoon failure, PNB Chairman and Managing Director K R Kamath said in New Delhi that RBI has clearly defined norms for banks for agricultural credit in drought affected areas.

"If any of the area is affected by drought, there is very clearly defined scheme for restructuring of accounts of that particular area," he said while announcing the first quarter result of the bank.

Kamath does not expect the impact of deficient rains on NPAs related to farm credit to be much as there would re-structuring.

Gross non-performing assets (NPA) of PNB has risen to 3.34% at the end of three-month period ended June 30, 2012 as against 2% during the same period of last fiscal.

NPAs in public sector banks stood at about 3.3% of the assets in 2011-12 against 2.3% a year ago.

Meanwhile, IMD said it expects monsoon deficiency to narrow down in the coming days with improvement in rains.

Monsoon rains have been deficient by about 22% so far this year across the country with a worrisome situation in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Gujarat.

The government has also set up an Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) headed by Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar to review the monsoon situation.