The south based banks are all gearing up for expansion processin the northern part of India. Plans of this nature harobored by banks like Laxmi Vilas Bank, Karur Vysya Bank, Dhanlaxmi Bank, Vijaya Bank and Federal Bank is mainly with the motive to gain national presence.

Dhanlaxmi Bank has plans to set up 325 branches by the year 2012-13 and more than 75% of this would be in north India.

Karur Vysya Bank, based in Tamil Nadu is targetting to set up 120 branches in the upcoming three years of which two thirds are in north India.

Kerala based Federal Bank aims to set around 100 branches. Again more than 50% of them are aimed to be located in the north. Vijaya Bank has set the target for 90 branches this fiscal of which 75% are aimed at the northern geography.

"Branches are just the touch points for customers and opening branches is a part of bigger strategy," said Bipin Kabra, CEO, Dhanlaxmi Bank.

"We will hire employees from north to connect the bank with local customers," says P.R. Somasundaram, MD and CEO, Lakshmi Vilas Bank. "If multinational banks can work in India by hiring Indian talent, then why south Indian banks operate in north India," he adds.

"There is enough space for every players as there are still millions of people in the country not having bank account," added PR Kalyanaraman, executive director, Federal Bank.