The Ministry of Finance (MoF) has asked the chief executives of state-owned banks (SoBs) and financial institutions to improve financial health.
It also exhorted them to work vigorously to achieve the targets set in the annual performance agreement (APA), sources said.
The directive came at a review meeting of the APA with Financial Institutions Division secretary Ashadul Islam in the chair on Thursday.
The heads of the SoBs and financial institutions sign the APA with the FID every fiscal when they vow to improve their financial health.
The APA contains issues like keeping non-performing loans (NPLs) at logical level, raising income by distributing loans and advances, improving overall financial conditions and lowering risks and strengthening financial base.
After the meeting, Agrani Bank Ltd managing director Mohammad Shams-Ul Islam said each and every APA criterion was duly reviewed.
"The meeting directed us to attain the targets given in the APA," he told the FE.
Replying to a query, Mr Islam said no special instruction was given at the meeting other than a push for achieving the targets.
In recent months, the state-owned banks are plagued with large NPLs creating hue and cry among politicians and economists.
As of September last year, the amount of defaulted loans in the country's banking sector reached an all-time high of Tk 1.0 trillion.
During the January-September period, bad debts jumped by nearly 34 per cent or Tk 250.67 billion to Tk 993.70 billion from Tk 743.03 billion in December 2017.
The size will be even bigger if the amount of rescheduled and written-off loans was taken into account.
During the period, the overall shortfall in provisioning against the NPLs swelled by over 20 per cent or Tk 13.60 billion.
