SC comes to aid of man whose credit score remained ‘negative’ for years

The Supreme Court has come to the rescue of a man whose credit score remained “negative” for years despite having no outstanding loan or default in payment.

A bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and KV Viswanathan was hearing a plea filed by Uttarakhand resident Rajendra Singh Panwar, who submitted that he had an adverse CIBIL score since 2020 despite not having any loan or default.

CIBIL Score is a 3-digit numeric summary of credit history that indicates a person’s creditworthiness.

In his petition, Panwar submitted that his credit profile showed a negative score, which prevented him from availing financial facilities.

Panwar contended that two other individuals with the same name had been issued the same PAN number and payment defaults committed by them were allegedly appearing in his CIBIL records.

Even after getting a new PAN, his high-risk score persisted due to the linkage between the new and old PANs. The top court then sought responses from major banks, including SBI and PNB, asking them to clarify whether Panwar had any outstanding loans or defaults.

In an affidavit filed in the apex court, Punjab National Bank (PNB) informed that it had not reported any default against Panwar and that records reflected no adverse credit information.

The State Bank of India (SBI) told the court that its reporting to CIBIL was limited strictly to facilities actually availed by the petitioner and linked to his updated PAN details.

CIBIL then informed the court that Panwar’s records have now been corrected in light of the clarifications.