Governor Shaktikanta Das of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) encouraged state-owned banks on Wednesday to implement measures announced by the central bank lately in "right earnest" and to continue focusing on actions to strengthen their balance sheets' resilience.

Das during a meeting with the MDs and CEOs of public sector banks acknowledged the important role being played by PSBs in extending various banking facilities including credit facilities to individuals and businesses while tackling the challenges brought on by the pandemic. "He impressed upon the banks to quickly implement the measures announced by RBI recently in the right earnest. He also urged the banks to continue focussing on steps to enhance the resilience of their balance sheets," the RBI said in a statement post the meeting held over video conference.

Earlier this month, the governor had announced a slew of measures, including a term liquidity facility of Rs 50,000 crore to ease access to emergency health services, to further improve lending to MSME sector, restructuring of loans, and rationalisation of compliance to KYC, in wake of the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Other matters that came up for discussion during the meeting, included the current state of the financial sector; credit flows to different sectors including to small borrowers, MSMEs; and progress in the implementation of Covid Resolution Framework.

Monetary policy transmission and implementation of Covid-related policy measures taken by RBI too were discussed. In his opening remarks, the governor acknowledged the important role being played by PSBs in extending various banking facilities including credit facilities to individuals and businesses while tackling the challenges brought on by the pandemic. The meeting was also attended by Deputy Governors M K Jain, M. Rajeswar Rao, Michael D Patra and T. Rabi Sankar.