Chanda Kochhar, the chief executive of ICICI bank said that the non performing assets (NPAs) of the bank were highest and the asset quality of the bank needed improvement.

The executive, in a conference at the World Economic Forum said, "I think the peak should be behind us." She added, "Going forward, we should see an improvement."

The banks gross bad debts increased to 4.7 percent of total loans during the July-September quarter from 4.2 percent in the preceding quarter.

Kochhar said that the interest rates would remain same for some time.

ICICI bank, among other leading banks, is restructuring its loans to put a check on the non performing assets. In a presentation, an ICICI spokesperson said that the bank had sold retail loans worth Rs. 700 crore to Asset Reconstruction Company and had written of retail loans amounting to Rs 600 crore.

SBI is also following the same measure to contain the rise in its bad loans.

In its quarterly policy review, the reserve Bank of India has directed the banks to increase the provisioning requirements for NPAs to 70 percent and it wants the banks to achieve this target by September 2010.