Most of Rs100bn loans written off in Musharraf era

By Rauf Klasra

ISLAMABAD: Industrialists, military men and politicians have got loans of over Rs100 billion written off from banks since 1985, the National Assembly Secretariat record has revealed.

A big chunk of loans was written off during the regime of former President Pervez Musharraf.

The beneficiaries also included politicians-cum-industrialists and a group of the print media that later joined the electronic media.

A few of those who got loans written off were genuine cases as they suffered from sick industries or bankruptcy. Their loans were written off according to rules and the prevalent law. Some of the beneficiaries, however, submitted bogus claims and the banks did not follow rules and regulations in writing off their loans.

The official record available with The News which was placed in the NA in the past showed that a mind-boggling sum of Rs30 billion in loans was written off between 1985-2002, benefiting the top politicians, military men and powerful industrial groups of the country. The list was compiled by the then caretaker government of Moin Qureshi in 1993.

In 2007, the auditor general of Pakistan had revealed in a report that during the period 2002-2007, loans worth Rs54 billion were written off by the Musharraf government. Thus, total figure had reached Rs85 billion. But, now the recent official report presented before the NA revealed that the total figure of written off loans had finally crossed Rs100 billion.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Dr Babar Awan’s announcement about the loan write-off on Tuesday was followed by the demand of Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif to recover the written off loans from politicians, might land many in big trouble.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had also taken suo moto notice in October 2007 after this correspondent had published a story in The News quoting the auditor general of Pakistan report that loans worth Rs54 billion were written off during the last five years. The issue is still pending before the court.

Likewise, the NA Public Accounts Committee headed by Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan has also taken serious note of the loan write-off and its report is yet to be tabled for further deliberation.

As many as 1,000 influential businessmen and Army men had a total of Rs18 billion loans written off by the government-owned banks during the first three years of the military government. The list was submitted in the NA when Zafarullah Jamali was the prime minister and Shaukat Aziz his finance minister.

The loan write-off scam was partially reported in the media in the early days of Musharraf but was finjavascript:void(0)ally swept under the carpet.

It may be added that these loans were written off after declaring these industrial units as “sick industry or on the pretext of bankruptcy”. Many of the beneficiaries denied having their loans written-off.