Recently, there has been newspaper report that the government has issued directives to stop auctioning of properties to recover defaults in small housing and agricultural loans. This is a very important and a serious issue. But I am afraid, apart from giving this news report; the media did not solicit views from anybody, not even from banking sector. The serious implications of this step for the banking and the economy were not highlighted properly. The government decision not to auction properties of the so-called small borrowers is nothing but a populist decision without taking into consideration the havoc this will play with the banks and financial institutions. Our society is not very well known for honouring financial commitments with institutions. This type of support for defaulters would encourage people to go back to the old days when there was no financial discipline in the society and bank loans could be misused for any purpose. It is hoped that sanity will ultimately prevail and the government would leave banking affairs to the banks. -TAMANNA AHMED, Karachi, via e-mail, June 17.