Govt working on guarantee scheme for educational loans: RBI

In a bid to remove problems faced by students in obtaining education loans, government was working on a scheme under which it would extend guarantee for advances upto Rs 7.5 lakhs, Reserve Bank of India governor D.Subba Rao said on Wednesday.

"There are grievances of students not getting loans or encountering problems...Understanding that there is a problem, the government is now working on a guarantee scheme," he told students here at an interactive programme organised by RBI and ABP News.

He said for loans upto Rs 7.5 lakhs where there was no third party guarantee or collateral security there would be guarantee given by the government.

"It is yet to be launched. Hopefully it would come and resolve some of these issues," he said replying to a question on the woes of students in getting educational loans.

On paper for loans upto Rs 4 lakhs there should be no collateral security or guarantee. "For good students and good institutions it is easier to get loans than for students not so good or institutions not rated so high," he said.

"But our endeavour is irrespective of level of achievements of institutions, they must have access to education loan upto Rs 4 lakhs," he said.

On inflation, he said "our endeavour, effort and expectation is that inflation will come down and will remain steady" so that it accelerate growth.

He also said RBI wanted to deepen penetration of banks either through bank branches or Business Correspondents since more than 50 per cent of the households in the country did not have bank accounts.

Noting that RBI and the government had initiated several steps towards financial inclusion with a view to ensuring that every household had bank accounts, he said it would become successful only when banks see it as a business opportunity.

Replying to another student, the RBI governor said the apex bank was playing a development role and had implemented steps for rural development including priority sector lending.

On security and safety of electronic transactions, he said "Securing security is shared responsibility. It is not the exclusive concern of RBI alone. It is responsibility of commercial banks and of the customers."

All the three should share the responsibility and work together to ensure that banking transactions especially electronic and mobile transactions were safe, he added.