HDFC Bank, the second largest private retail bank of the country has reached the pinnacle in the segment thereby displacing ICICI Bank from its long held position. The recovery in demand condition and positive growth in the economy has enabled the bank to increase the figures of its loan book in home, car and two wheeler segment.

The month of March recorded lending worth Rs. 4000 crore for the bank which is almost double than the amount disbursed by the bank last April. The growth in loans has been in almost all segments like automobile loans, commercial vehicles, personal and home loans, two-wheeler loans and credit cards.

The retail lending of the bank in March was marked by credit worth Rs 1,300 crore in auto loans, Rs 1,200 crore in home loans, Rs 400 crore in the form of commercial vehicle loans and Rs 300 crore of construction equipment loans. Disbursements in the personal loan segment amounted to Rs 600 crore.

"This has been the best ever month for us. In March itself, we disbursed retail loans of Rs 4,000 crore and this comes on the back of January and February where the average disbursements were at around Rs 3,500 each. Each of our business in the retail side is profitable and we have shown the highest-ever profit in the retail asset business," said Pralay Mondal, country head - retail assets & credit cards, HDFC Bank.

The bank has shown a growth in lending when its counterparts are in a foray to move away from retail lending atleast for the time being owing to bad credit from the unsecured loan segment.

The loan disbursement scenario for ICICI Bank which has till now been the market leader has been in a way that the bank has lent out home loans aggregating Rs 700 crore, auto loans of Rs 300 crore, commercial vehicle loans of Rs 200 crore and loans against property of close to Rs 150 crore, as per officials of the banking industry.