No impact of Covid-19 on PFC’s growth: Rajeev Sharma

PFC has disbursed a fair amount in the first week of the lockdown. How has the business been for you till March amidst the Covid-19 outbreak and the lockdown?
There was no impact of Covid-19 on our disbursements. We could disburse more than Rs 11,000 crore during the last three days of the financial year and our legal and project divisions worked day and night. I am really happy that there was no impact of Covid-19 on the performance of Power Finance Corporation and its officers.

Do you think you will be able to maintain the momentum if the lockdown continues?
We should be able to maintain the same momentum because all officers are fully trained to work from home and in the power ,sector the growth which is taking place is because all households in the country have been connected and demand in the domestic sector is increasing. The sub-transmission and distribution systems have to be strengthened and upgraded. So, I do not see any impact of Covid-19 on our growth. We have been able to maintain our yield at 10.62%. Our spread is 2.8% and we have been able to maintain growth in our loan asset book.

Do you worry about what will happen to NPAs, repayments once the RBI moratorium period is over? What will happen to discoms?
There is a moratorium of three months. It will simply increase the repayment period of three months more. For example, f there was a load for 12 years’ repayment, it will now be 12 years three months. Of course, there will be a little problem of funds flow. We will have to borrow from the market for further disbursement as well as for making repayments for borrowingss.

At this juncture, you cannot go to the international market. We will have to depend on the domestic market either on taxable bonds or commercial papers. We can also try LTRO which has been very recently declared by the Reserve Bank of India. It is a loan for three months and it is a cheaper loan for the infrastructure sector.

We are in consultation with the State Bank of India and so I do not think that there should be any problem. Our growth will continue. Repayments for three months may not come but we have already prepared our action plan on how much more funds we need to mobilise to meet our disbursement requirement as well as for repayments to be made to our lenders.

How has PFC contributed to the PM care fund? What are you ensuring that everybody at PFC is doing his/her bit?
We are with our honourable prime minister in our endeavour to help the people of the country. First of all, we asked all our employees to contribute one day’s salary which has been already deposited in the PM Cares Fund.

Second, under corporate social responsibility (CSR), we have already deposited Rs 200 crore in the PM Cares Fund;

Third, we have sanctioned Rs 50 lakh to the district collectors of Kota, Siddharth Nagar and Bulandshahr. We have asked those district collectors to spend the CSR amount on purchasing masks, PPEs, sanitizers, food items and any other medical equipment which they deem fit to fight COVID-19.

We are getting a very good response. All the three collectors are spending that money. In Kota, they are making food available to the needy people. In Bulandshahr, they are purchasing PPE equipment. Similarly, the Siddharth Nagar district collector is very dynamic and active. We are in touch with them.