SBI to adopt repo rate as external benchmark for all floating rate loans from Oct 1
Mumbai: State Bank of India on Monday said it will adopt repo rate as the external benchmark for all floating rate loans for MSME, home and retail loans, from October 1, 2019.
On September 4, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had mandated all banks to link all new floating rate personal or retail loans and floating rate loans to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to an external benchmark from October 1 onwards.
We have decided to adopt repo rate as the external benchmark for all floating rate loans for MSME, housing and retail loans effective October 1, 2019, the bank said in a release.
The RBI gave the banks options to benchmark their floating rate loans either to repo rate, three-month or six-month treasury bills or any benchmark market interest rate published by Financial Benchmarks India Private (FBIL).
The bank has also extended the external benchmark-based lending to medium enterprises, to boost lending to the MSME sector as a whole.
It had introduced floating rate home loans effective July 1, 2019, but has made some modifications in the scheme effective October 1, 2019, to comply with the latest regulatory guidelines, the release said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
