New Delhi: The country is on a strong stand, and economic fundamentals are strong too, opined the Finance Minister as he addressed a press conference from Delhi.

While the FM's critics have argued that demonetisation and GST resulted in an economic slowdown, with the GDP declining to 5.7, a low in three years.

The FM suggested that India's economic fundamentals remain strong. Speaking about demonetisation and GST, he suggested that there is no reliable data source to arrive at the total job losses.

The FM utilized the conference not only to defend the reforms such as demonetisation and GST, and also announced newer measures with an intention to boost economy.

One among the big-bang announcements on Tuesday, was the recapitalisation of PSU banks. The cabinet approved Rs 2.11 lakh crore as an amount to capitalise public sector banks. Of this 76,000 crore will be from budgetary support while Rs 1.35 lakh would be from front-loaded recap bonds.

Without divulging much details as to how this infusion would work, he offered that the bonds would be made public in due course.

Previously the government in 2015, had announced an infusion of Rs 70,000 crore in state-run banks through a period of four years to meet capital requirement norms. These norms would ensure that PSU banks could get in line with global risk norms such as Basel-III.

While the government did infuse systemic chunks into the debt-roiled Indian banking system, the issue of NPAs have more or less remained unsolved.

Rajiv Kumar, the secretary for Financial Services suggested that proper diagnosis is a need for proactive resolution. Banks NPAs have jumped from 36% in March 2014 to nearly 82% in June 2017.

The implementation of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Codes, SARFAESI Act, and strengthening the DRT laws, according to him have made recovery processes more effective. According to him there was a need for an transpareny procedure that looked at a timely resolution mechanism, and the IBC achieves that.

Besides these the Indian PSU banking system, has achieved the merger of SBI's five subsidiary banks into one. These involve the State Bank of Patiala, Hyderabad, Travancore, Bikaner & Jaipur, and the Bhartiya Mahila Bank.

"Having cleaned up and discovered NPAs, and Basel 3 compliance, this is time for take-off," he added.

He further hinted that now that after this infusion, banks would be ready to offer credit to genuine customers.

The infusion would also help arrive at bigger-stronger, globally-competitive PSBs that can offer customer-friendly banking services. The infusion would also offer adequate credit for prudent and well-deserving banks, besides offer faster MSME growth and create more employment opportunities.