Around 95% of MSMEs availed moratorium: Bank of Baroda

In a view to reach out to small borrowers, BoB conducted webinar with around 77,000 MSME players on Tuesday.

By Ankur Mishra

Bank of Baroda (BoB) has provided moratorium to around 95% of micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) borrowers, executive director (ED) Vikramaditya Singh Khichi told FE. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on March 27 announced moratorium on payment of term loan instalments for three months from March 1, 2020. The total exposure of Bank of Baroda to the MSME sector is around Rs 91,000 crore.

BoB had, on March 25, set up an emergency credit line to provide funds to its existing MSMEs and corporate borrowers impacted by the outbreak of Covid-19. The bank has disbursed Rs 2,000 crore to borrowers under the Covid-19 emergency credit till now, Khichi further said. The bank believes more MSME players are likely to avail credit line from the bank due to attractive rate. The bank is offering loan at the rate of 7.25%.

In a view to reach out to small borrowers, BoB conducted webinar with around 77,000 MSME players on Tuesday. The bank urged MSMEs to avail benefit of one time restructuring, among others.

The RBI had earlier extended the deadline for one-time debt restructuring of MSMEs from March 31, 2020, to December 31, 2020. The announcement came after finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her Union Budget 2020 speech said that the government has asked RBI to extend the window till March 31, 2021.