| Bank boards as 'NPAs |
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The scrutiny of board deliberations suggests that PSB board members focus more on compliance with regulations and other trivial issues. For example, in one bank, the taxi fare reimbursement policy took up more time than the loan recovery policy. Other issues discussed included purchase of office premises and provision of leased residential accommodation to officers. In another bank, the board was more interested in discussing the details of a lecture by the chairman at a college; how extensive coverage can be given to the finance minister's visit to the bank; and disciplinary action against manager- level employees. The location of branches and ATMs was another favourite topic. The surprising point to note is that PSBs, despite their government ownership, focus less on financial inclusion than their private sector peers. There's more. On both financial reporting and compliance, private sector banks discuss in detail three times the number of issues that PSBs do. Among the areas of recent concern in PSBs is the worsening asset quality, and yet there is a general absence of a calibrated discussion in boards of the sectors within which the greatest stress has emerged, and implications this might have for further loan growth in those sectors. Recoveries through the Debt Recovery Tribunals and under the Sarfaesi Act are inadequately discussed, and progress in bringing stressed assets back to health are also insufficiently analysed. As the report says, scenario analysis through stress- testing is absent, and specific plans for worst- case scenarios find no mention in board meetings. It is difficult, therefore, to disagree with the panel's suggestions that there are limits to the ability of regulation and supervision to upgrade the quality of board deliberations in PSBs. And, that there is an urgent need for these boards to be empowered with strategic and domain skills, and with independence by changing the entire appointment process for boards. As the Nayak panel says, the existing appointment process is structural. The Bank Nationalisation Acts of 1970 and 1980 lay down in granular detail the manner in which board positions are to be filled. There are eight broad categories of directors. Similarly, the State Bank of India Act of 1955 refers to seven director categories for SBI, while IDBI Bank ( constituted under the Companies Act) has five different director categories. In comparison, the new Companies Act of 2013 lays down three categories of directors, though not in a structural manner: executive directors, part- time independent directors and part- time nonindependent directors. The current appointment process of PSB board members has given rise to the ridiculous practice of bank chairmen having no say on who all are coming in as non- official directors. As a result, if some of these directors are of poor quality or get on to the board with parallel agendas, the chairman starts viewing them as unhelpful to the interests of the bank. That's the reason why many of the PSB boards have seen internal fissures leading to poor governance. There is no doubt that director quality is compromised in government's appointments. While the government seeks the professionally qualified for board positions, new private sector banks, and increasingly old private sector banks, search for the professionally talented. The distinction matters. For example, almost all chartered accountants would qualify for appointment to PSB boards, but a very small subset would be sought after by the private sector bank boards. In general, it seems the questions nobody has asked are: can PSB board members really provide the management with guidance and control as their mandate formally requires? Does the composition of the board matter for the bank's performance during a crisis? Attempts to improve the quality of PSB boards have been made in the past without results. For example, the Ganguly committee on corporate governance in banks had raised some critical issues way back in 2002. Among other things, the committee had suggested that the boards must have eminent people who are capable of providing a necessary oversight coupled with their duties of loyalty to the shareholders and provide the necessary checks and balances. The board should also be empowered to question the management and must be comfortable in insisting upon straightforward explanations from them. In addition, the boards should ensure that the responsibilities of directors are well defined and the banks should arrange need- based training for the directors in this regard. The result has been predictable. Banks were advised to place the report to their boards and directors were to sign the covenants in public interest. Many directors ignored the suggestion. In its report, the Nayak committee has also given detailed suggestions on the way out of the mess, giving a lot of food for thought for the new finance minister. Hopefully, the report will not remain unread. Taxi fare reimbursement policy often takes precedence over loan recovery strategy in the board meetings of public sector banks SHYAMAL MAJUMDAR The surprising point to note is that public sector banks, despite their government ownership, focus less on financial inclusion than their private sector peers |
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