Mumbai, April 2 :    Mumbai, April 2:  Project finance is the big word at the State Bank of India (SBI) this fiscal. The country's largest bank, whose prudential norms allow it to disburse 30 per cent of its total credit portfolio towards project financing, now plans to lend 30 per cent of its incremental growth in advances for the purpose this fiscal. With the bank's total credit portfolio put at Rs 1,20,000 crore, this figure would come to over Rs 35,000 crore, chairman Janki Ballabh said today. Ballabh made these comments in response to apprehension among companies that they would face a credit shortage for project financing. Speaking at the Banking Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), he also said that since project lending is not yet the forte of banks, they should place more emphasis on creating adequate skill and expertise while evaluating any funding proposal. Later, speaking to The Telegraph, Ballabh said for the current year, on an incremental basis, the bank is looking at disbursing close to Rs 7,000 crore towards project financing. He admitted that the bank had witnessed a sluggish offtake with regard to the power sector, where most of its sanctions could not go through. 'The loans were not disbursed and most of them have lapsed. However, there is a good offtake in the telecom and roadways sectors,' he added. The bank is looking at incremental advances growing by Rs 20,000 crore this fiscal. Foreign debt Meanwhile, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Bimal Jalan today said that in line with its plans to achieve more stability on the external front, the Centre is looking at pre-paying a part of its external debt. Speaking at the summit, Jalan said the RBI favoured maintaining adequate liquidity in the system and softer interest rates, while parrying questions on whether there would be a cut in the bank rate or the cash reserve ratio in the forthcoming monetary and credit policy. Banking circles point out that the government's plans to pre-pay a part of its external debt follows the record foreign exchange reserves which is now at over $ 53 billion. 'The rise in foreign exchange reserves shows the confidence in the Indian economy and the government was already looking at prepaying some of its overseas loans,' he pointed out. He then added that the nature of these loans to be pre-paid would depend on the composition of the debt. Earlier, delivering the valedictory address at the summit, Jalan said the ability to take and absorb risks by the financial sector was significant and in this context, prudential norms were the touchstone for 'sound banking'.