The coronavirus outbreak coupled with economic crisis and the resultant prolonged business disruptions have made it impossible for borrowers to repay their loans given under the scheme resulting bank’s credit profiles twisted to the down side, several general managers of leading banks said.

According to latest Finance Ministry data, a massive sum of Rs. 1.6 trillion with accumulated interest as at March 31 2023 has to be repaid to the local banking sector by business enterprises ,SMEs and individuals , hit by Covid -19 and subsequent economic crisis.

It has been indicated that non-settled loans obtained by affected business owners and persons under concessionary terms in five stages are now amounting to Rs1.6 trillion and it was 15.65 percent from the total debt stock.

Sri Lanka’s small and medium businesses are forced to default loans taken at a low interest of 7 percent at that time as the interest rates have been increased to 13 percent pushing them into in more trouble.