Banking and monetary regulator, Reserve Bank of India has declared that the draft guidelines for giving new bank licenses to eligible contenders will be ready by January.

A discussion paper had been introduced by RBI in August seeking suggestions and recommendations on the issue.

There are a large number of big corporate entities as well as non banking finance companies (NBFCs) in the race to get a license to bank in India. Amongst them are Reliance Capital, the Aditya Birla Group and the Tatas including Shriram Finance, LIC Housing and Mahindra Finance.

"Based on the comments and suggestions received from various parties and discussions held with major stakeholders in October 2010, it is proposed to put the draft guidelines in the public domain by end of January 2011," the central bank said in its second quarter policy review.

The apex bank will also be coming up with discussion paper regarding the mode of presence of foreign banks. "A discussion paper is in final stages of preparation," it said.