NEW DELHI: Samajwadi Party neta Akhilesh Yadav‘s swipe at govt over its approval for the sale of IDBI Bank drew a sharp retort from finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who reminded him of the state of “ruin” public sector banks were left in by the previous UPA govt before they were revived by the Narendra Modi govt.“Only the govt is left to be sold. It seems the BJP govt has decided to sell everything through ‘season end sale’ as its own shop is closing down,” Akhilesh, a Congress ally, said following the Union Cabinet’s nod for the bank’s sale.Hitting back, Sitharaman said, “The UPA received support from your party starting in 2004. The UPA left banks in a pathetic condition. It is strange that you are talking about banks now and didn’t question your allies then!”“Allies now in the INDI Alliance ruined public sector banks through ‘phone banking’ and ‘crony capitalism’. During the tenure of the UPA govt- backed by your party – IDBI Bank itself extended loans to individuals from whom recovering both the principal and the interest is an exercise we are undertaking,” she said.It is the BJP-headed NDA govt under Modi that revitalised the entire banking system, including IDBI Bank, through transparent policies and the infusion of capital, she added.
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“Now that the banks are in a strong position, you are feigning sympathy,” she told the former UP CM.The ‘phone banking’ jibe was coined by BJP to point to how banks loaned huge sums under questionable circumstances to business houses at the prodding of certain politicians, creating a massive burden of NPAs and leading to what came to be known as the “twin balance sheet problem”, and hampering growth.The Modi govt has often highlighted the record profits public sector banks have notched due to its reforms.