Mumbai, Aug 7 (PTI) The Mumbai Congress on Friday asked the Reserve Bank of India to continue loan moratorium and waive interest on EMIs till December as people had lost their income due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown.

To help borrowers deal with liquidity crunch during the pandemic, the RBI had announced a three-month loan moratorium in March, which was later extended by another three months till August 31.

Also Read | Baby Elephant Found Dead Under Achankovil Bridge in Kerala's Pathanamthitta District.

Borrowers opting for loan moratorium can defer payment of the interest and principal component of the loan during this period.

In a letter to the RBI governor, Mumbai Congress vice president Amarjeet Singh Manhas said, "The RBI had allowed banks to provide a moratorium till August 2020 on fixed-term loans and EMI payments, but the banking regulator did not order banks to provide such relief. It gave the option to banks to take a call on whether they are in a position to extend the measure for customers."

Also Read | MHA Permits OCI Cardholders to Enter India : Live News Breaking And Coronavirus Updates on August 7, 2020.

"Banks are not obligated to fulfill RBI's suggestion and can choose to ignore it based on financial health," he said in the letter, adding that people of the country need to be assured that banks and other financial institutions will not exploit them during the lockdown.

Manhas said people have various types of loans and lower-income groups use their credit cards for monthly expenses and to make EMI payments etc, and they too should be given some relief.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)