Revealed: These are the country's top 10 defaulting companies

Even as debate continues to rage over whether names of defaulters must be made public, a team of journalists at Newslaundry.com has gained exclusive access to a list that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has put together detailing, account-wise, corporate loans that have been under default.According to the list, the Indian banks have witnessed loan defaults to the tune of roughly Rs 5 lakh crore, for which no recovery proceedings are under way. Within this, about Rs 1.08 lakh crore has been termed as wilful defaults while non-wilful defaults stand at Rs 3.97 lakh crore.The list, in which the central bank details all defaults over Rs 25 lakh and distributes to banks every quarter, has over 1 lakh entries in its latest iteration.The team scoured through the list to look for defaults over Rs 500 crore and has shared with CNBC-TV18 the list of top 10 defaulting companies. It must be clarified, though, that this list is not the same that the RBI submitted to the Supreme Court in a sealed envelope in an ongoing NPA case recently.The list below mentions the account-wise details of the country's top 10 defaulting companies. Usha Ispat is the largest defaulter while, surprisingly, LIC is the top lender. Two government firms, Hindustan Cables and Hindustan Photofilms, also figure on the list (on the third and fourth positions, respectively).

However, it is not clear whether fresh loans were given to these companies since or whether their current outstanding amounts are just a compounded figure from more-than-a-decade-old loans, she added."The list throws up some surprising and difficult questions," consultant Ashvin Parekh told CNBC-TV18, adding that if companies that have defaulted back in 2003 continue to figure on the list now, "how is the banking system working on in terms of recovery or write-off?"He added that LIC's name of the list -- as a bigger default-facing lender than even SBI -- is another surprising point. LIC does give out loans and subscribes to corporate bonds, but Parekh said that the insurance giant's name on the list is surprising, given that it does not enjoy the same statutory recovery rights as banks do.The Newslaundry team reached out to every company on this list but did not elicit a response from any, barring Kingfisher.