hi all
Mr T S Krishnamurthy has a very valid point. I agree with him. However, I want to give a clarification, as to why I was particular that the top management of Bank of India has to take the responsibility.
As per Edu loan scheme, the loan 'refusal' should be done by one level above the sanctioning authority in all the banks. If Regional Manager has the power to sanction the loan, then refusal can be done by one level above him. RBI and Govt. have developed this system to protect the students from discriminatory attitude of the officials and to render justice. While refusing, the higher level officer will have to ensure and satisfy himself that the reasons are correct.
In this particular case, the student was denied the loan for the reason that the 'course was not approved'. Definitely, the rejection of the loan should have been done by a very high level officer at Zonal level or Head Office level. No Branch level officer at junior level can reject such applications. At that level, the Senior level officer who has rejected the loan should have applied his/her mind carefully and cross checked with the University or any other Authorities.
When the loan was rejected, the student went to the High Court seeking remedy. At that time, legal notices would have been issued by the lawyers. It is not a regular recovery of debt case. Since it is something serious at High Court level, their legal department would have gone through all the documents. The Bank had engaged their lawyers to defend their cases before the Hon'ble Court.
Since it involved the High Court, the entire background note would have gone upto Charmian level. Definitely, the process would not have happened at lower level. Even at that stage, higher officials at Head office, including Chairman could have advised the Regional Manager or other senior field level officials to cross verify the information about the approval of the course.
It is pertinent to point out here, that Hon'ble Justice has remarked in the judgement that the Bank's action was 'whimsical and discriminatory'. Only after conscious consideration of the above facts, I made my point that even top level management should be accountable.
I agree with Mr TSK sir that ground level officials are to be sensitized about the schemes and attitudes. That is what we have been impressing upon the banks to sensitize the ground level officials. But however in this case, nothing would have happened without the knowledge of the top management. I wish to clarify that my observation in my earlier mail, is only for this case and not in general.
As said earlier, we will be happy to publish the views of Chairman of Bank of India.
I thank Sri TSK sir for his views.
Srinivasan
Moderator
91766 50273
On Fri, Mar 12, 2010 at 1:26 PM, Krishnamurthy T.S. <krishnamurthy.ts@gmail.com > wrote:
I am sorry to differ from you.
How can you blame the Chairman?Do you think officers will change their attitude if C&MD is punished.They may repeat so that they show it on their Chairman.The C&Md of PSU banks are most harassed,I know it for certain from my experience.The officer concerned here should pay the fine as I have seen often it is the counter person dealing with public who is arrogant or indifferent.In fact on many occasions,things improve if you bring it to the notice of senior officials.The Bank staff /junior officers are to be sensitised.Their promotion shd depend upon proper feedback from the clients.Best wishesTSKT.S.Krishna Murthy
Former Chief Election Commissioner of India
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On 3/11/10, Prime Point Srinivasan <prpoint@gmail.com > wrote:
dear friends
For the past two months, we have been writing in these groups and in our ezine about the attitude of PSU Banks towards poor students for sanctioning education loan for higher studies. India Vision Group has also set up an Education Loan Task Force (ELTF) and conducted an interaction session with bankers recently.
For the past one week, leading Tamil magazines have been writing about ELTF and education loan procedures. Our main grievance against these banks are that they do not follow RBI and IBA guidelines. Sadly, many of the Bank Managements do not consider important to educate their branch officials on the procedures of edu loans.
Today all the Newspapers have carried a story about how Bank of India was directed to pay Rs.5000/- as court charges to the aggrieved person. Please read the story
It is a standing example of casual approach by Bank of India management and branches towards education loan. One engineering student was denied a loan by the bank for the reason that the course was not approved. When the student approached Madras High Court, the Hon'ble Judge directed the Bank to pay Rs.5000/- as compensation to the student and also directed the bank to grant loan within two weeks, as the course was in the approved list. .
This incident clearly indicates how the top management of Bank of India was negative in their approach. In fact, I would go to the extent of blaming only the top management for causing hardship to a student forcing him to go to the judiciary. Instead, they should have discussed with the student and sorted out the problems. Banks can engage a lawyer with huge fees, while all the poor students cannot afford to knock at the doors of judiciary. Driving the poor students to judiciary reflects the 'arrogance' of the management.
For creating such unhealthy situation, I personally feel, the penalty levied by the Hon'ble Court should be recovered officially from the Chairman of the Bank of India and remitted to the student. I feel, it should not be paid by the Bank. Then only, the top managements will have some concern for the poor people, shedding their 'indifferent' attitude.
I am endorsing a copy of this mail to Chairman of Bank of India , RBI and to Members of Parliament. If the Chairman of Bank of India sends any response, we will publish in these columns.
SrinivasanModerator91766 50273
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