Indian Banks’ Rising Bad Debt Is ‘Major Challenge,’ RBI Says

Rising bad loans at Indian lenders remain “a major challenge” amid a slowdown in Asia’s third-largest economy, the nation’s central bank said.

Nonperforming loans rose to 986 billion rupees ($15.7 billion) at the end of March from 652 billion rupees a year earlier, the Reserve Bank of India said in a report yesterday on the country’s banking industry. The ratio of sour debt to total lending swelled to 3.6 percent from 3.1 percent.