The Governor of Reserve Bank of India, Mr. D. Subbarao has once again stressed upon the importance of the Financial Inclusion Plan. He also said that the banks have a very crucial role to play in reaching the masses, residing in the remote areas.

Financial Inclusion Plan is an initiative of Government to provide basic banking facilities to the people who do not have access to it. A target to cover the villages with population above...

The Know Your Customer (KYC) norms have now become vital in banking space. Banks in India have been asked by the Reserve Bank of India to simplify them in order to make things easier for the bank customers.

The steps are taken considering the report submitted by the Damodaran committee. The committee was formed to look into banking services provided to the small customers and pensioners.

The Reserve Bank of India said that it received several complaints...

The Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) has with the support of National Association for the Blind (NAB) and International institute of Information Technology (IIIT-B), both of which are located in Bangalore has launched "NETRA SARATHY".

It is a tool specially designed for visually challenged candidate to take the common exam test for the recruitment of bank offices which was conducted this year for the first time. As a result of the development such candidate appearing...

Banks are on a branch expansion spree in a bid to increase their presence pan nation.

Primarily the public sector lenders are the one that are on the expansion spree but even the private sector lenders are pacing it up. Private sector lender Karur Vysya Bank has announced to open eight new branches.

n the present fiscal year the bank has already added 59 new branches. The branch count of the bank will read 426 after...

Institute of Banking personnel Selection (IBPS), an autonomous body which conducts competitive exams for the recruitment of bank officers and clerks for the public sector banks, plans to conduct 5 common exams every year.

The institute proposes that separate exams should be conducted for clerks as well as for officers respectively during a year and one separate exam to judge candidates for the post of specialist officers should be held, said Director, Mr M. Balachandran.

The...

Gold loan provider, Manappuram Finance aims to keep its net interest margin (NIM) to 13% in this fiscal, informed a top official of the bank.

"Our cost of borrowing is around 12.5 per cent on an average and despite rise in the borrowing cost, we hope to have a slightly higher margin at 13 percent for the fiscal," Manappuram Managing Director I Unnikrishnan said.

Speaking about price of gold, he said, "We don't see a downward trend...

Public sector lender Punjab National Bank has declared having sponsored a vocational rehabiliation center at the Ernakulam General Hospital. The act of the bank comes as part of its corporate social responsibility (CSR).

The inauguration of the program was done by the District Collector, Mr Sheik Pareeth. The aim of the rehab center is to aid patients who have undergone limb replacement as well as allied treatment at the General Hospital.

The lender will also...

Public sector lender Corporation Bank has been recently visited by Chairman of Indian Banks' Association as well as CMD of Bank of Baroda, Mr MD Mallya.

Mr Mallya, on his visit talked about the increased importance of Information Technology in the banking sector and also talked to other senior executives of the bank, said the bank in a release.

He added that banks have huge arenas of growth even in the present situation.

CMD of Corporation Bank,...

Private sector lender Axis Bank is laying ambitious plans to give a 30% pump up to its retail business with prime focus on generating business from smaller cities.

"The bank aims at increasing the share of retail loans to 30% of total loans from the current 21% in the next three years," said Jairam Shridharan, senior vice-president and head consumer lending and payments.

"Tier II and Tier III centres and smaller cities have emerged as drivers...

Private sector lender Federal Bank has aimed to hire as many as 1500 employees to its circle in 1 or 2 years tenor. The recruiment would mostly be for the post of probationary officer (PO).

Superannuation is taking place at a high pace and nearly 1000 employees of bank are retiring, informed Executive Director of the bank, Mr Abraham Chacko.

"The banking industry had witnessed massive recruitments during the post-nationalisation period. A majority of these employees...

Private sector lender Axis Bank has tied up with Manipal University to offer a one year PG diploma in banking services to people.

The successful completion of this course will give the students direct entry as Assistant Managers with Axis Bank, said a press release.

It is a full time residential program with all graduates being eligible for the same.

Similar programs are also offered by lenders like ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank...

Public sector lender Punjab National Bank has set up a special 'Gen Next' branch in Lucknow which focuses specially on the youth customer segment.

The new branch was opened on Saturday, 03rd December'2011.

"In the youth bulge economy, attracting young customer is the need of the hour and in order to do so, the Gen Next Branch will provide Gen Next banking facilities," said CMD of the bank, Mr K R Kamath.

The youth segment being tech savvy,...

Private sector lender Ratnakar Bank has laid ambitious plans of boosting up its branch count to 200 in the coming year and forth, informed CEO and MD of the bank, Mr Vishwavir Ahuja.

The bank has plans to establish about 35-40 branches in the next 4-5 months time with special focus on Chennai and Hyderabad where the bank is still to set foot, added Mr Ahuja.

"We already have 30-35 branch licences from the RBI which will...

Banking and monetary regulator Reserve Bank of India has decided to bring out new currency notes of Rs 10 denomination soon.

The new notes will be under the signature of RBI governor, D Subbarao.

Existing notes will continue to remain in circulation as before, said the apex bank.

HSBC, a foreign lender is likely to get approval from regulator Reserve Bank of India to acquire selective assets of the Indian operations of Royal Bank of Scotland but with added clauses to the deal.

The regulator had earlier refused to give its nod to the deal. It is expected that RBI will most probably accept the idea of portfolio sale of RBS' assets to HSBC, but however will not allow the automatic transfer of...

The government has taken the initiative of cumulating the regional rural banks (RRBs) state wise so as to make more effective utilization of their resources, said sources familiar with the process. RRBs are a major part of the financial inclusion drive of the government which is presently a priority for it.

The consolidation process would engulf as many as 63 RRBs. The number is expected to be brought down to 27.

Every sponsor bank of each of...

Banks have now got the relaxation to set up branches in Tier II cities of India without needing any prior approval from regulator, Reserve Bank of India.

Tier II cities refer to those which have a population between 50,000 to less than 1 lakh.

"Now that general permission to banks has been extended for opening of branches in Tier 2 centres, domestic scheduled commercial banks (other than RRBs) will be allowed to open administrative offices and central...

The largest lender of the country, State Bank of India has initiated the concept of mobile banking to reach out to people of Meghalaya.

The Shillong branch of the bank has started 'Bank on Wheels' to reach to the doorstep of villagers in the nearby rural areas. The vehicle was handed over to the Meghalaya Rural Development Society by SBI Managing Director A Krishna Kumar.

"A total number of 662 unbanked villages were allotted to...

Public sector lender Indian Bank has initiated a training institute aimed at training rural people on skill sets needed to start self employment projects. The program has been named as ' Indian Bank Self Employment Training Institute' located in Tiruvallur district near Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

The launch was declared by CMD of the bank, Mr T M Bhasin. At a function held in a village in Tiruvallur district, Mr Rakesh Singh, Additional Secretary, Financial Services,...

Private sector lending major, HDFC Bank and telecom major Vodafone India have joined hands to start mobile banking operations in rural areas of the country with the aim of taking forward the aim of financial inclusion.

The two entities have chosen Chomu district in Rajastha to initiate their pilot drive for the country wide financial inclusion campaign using mobile banking.

The mobile banking was launched by deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India, Mr K C...