ISLAMABAD, Nov 15: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has claimed to have recovered Rs110 billion in defaulted bank loans within a period of four years and two months from defaulters whose names are not known to the bureau. Answering a question raised by Senator Farhatullah Babar in the Senate about the recovery of defaulted bank loans, the NAB informed the upper house that the bureau took concrete steps in helping banks in their drive to recover defaulted loans.

“Based on the relentless efforts of the NAB and active participation of banks and financial institutions, the data received from the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) shows cash recovery of Rs110.61 billion during the period October 12, 1999 to December 2003 against defaulted loans,” the NAB said.

The NAB informed the house that the names and addresses of the defaulters from whom the money had been recovered had not been provided by the State Bank of Pakistan to the NAB.

“The bureau seems to have recovered defaulted loans from ghosts,” Senator Farhatullah Babar said while talking to Dawn.

The senator from the opposition benches said it was ridiculous that the NAB did not know the names and addresses of those from whom it had recovered the defaulted amount.

The senator said that the defaulted amount had been recovered from bigwigs and the bureau was reluctant to disclose their names. “We had already asked the NAB from the floor of the upper house on October 15 to disclose the names of defaulters but on that occasion we were told that a reply from the NAB had not been received,” the senator said.

Replying to another query by the senator, the NAB revealed that it had received its share of Rs1.58 billion from the total amount of Rs110.61 billion in defaulted bank loans during the period from October 12, 1999 to December 2003.

However, Senator Babar said the NAB received three per cent of the total recovery of bank default; therefore, the amount received by the bureau should be over Rs3 billion.

The NAB informed the upper house that since the year 2004 the SBP had changed its reporting pattern and banks were required to report recoveries against Non-Performing Loans (NPLs) and not against defaulted loans.