Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Aug 28, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Aug 28, 2003 |
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Money & Banking
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Public Sector Banks Technology for growth
Mr S.S. Kohli, CMD, Punjab National Bank.
Having firmly established itself as one of the country's premier banks, plans are on to take it to a new growth orbit. "Our vision is to evolve into a world-class technology-driven, cost-effective and customer-friendly institution, providing comprehensive financial services while serving various segments of the society, especially the weaker section," said the Chairman and Managing Director, PNB, Mr S.S. Kohli. The bank's strong fundamentals are reflected in its financials that have been showing rapid improvement with each year. The bank's capital and reserves at the end of March 2003 reached Rs 4,033 crore compared to Rs 3,216 crore in March 2002, while its capital-to-risk-asset ratio (CRAR) moved up to 12.02 per cent from 10.70 per cent at the end of March 2002. The bank's net profit rose to Rs 842.20 crore at the end of March 2003, registering a growth of 50 per cent over the net of March 2002. The bank's total deposits as on March 31, 2003, was Rs 75,813 crore while advances stood at Rs 40,228 crore. "Our focus now would be on making the bank a technology-driven bank, so that it can not only match any other bank but also stay a step ahead. Towards this, PNB has taken a number of information technology initiatives to provide its large clientele the best of technology," Mr Kohli said. He pointed out that the efforts in this direction are already being recognised, with the bank being conferred the `best bank award for excellence in banking technology' by the Institute for Development and Research in Banking Technology (IDRBT), Hyderabad, for the year 2001-02. Already, the bank has computerised 3,166 branches, constituting more than 75 per cent of the of total branches and capturing over 87 per cent of the bank's total business through computerisation. It has also installed over 300 ATMs. Today, PNB provides telebanking facilities at 115 locations while Remote Access facility is available at 31 branches. PNB recently embarked on a major initiative to increase the spread of its Centralised Banking Solution (CBS) project, aimed at providing anywhere, anytime banking. With CBS having already been implemented in over 218 branches, the bank hopes to increase its spread to 500 branches by the end of fiscal 2003-04. At the 43 cities where CBS has been implemented, customers have the facility of instant fund transfers across cities, collection of cheques, deposit of funds, instant access to statement of account and a host of other value-added services through any of the interconnected branches. The bank recently launched Internet Banking Services in branches connected under the CBS, thereby proving round-the-clock banking from the user's PC. The service also instantly provides customers other value-added services such as online stop payment facilities and to view status of cheques. "Another major initiative being planned by the bank is the introduction of electronic bill payment services in the near future," Mr Kohli said. He said a host of security features such as firewalls, intrusion detection systems and digital certificates with 128 bit strong encryption has been implemented keeping in view RBI guidelines on Internet Banking and the need for security to protect privacy, confidentiality and integrity of customer information. The bank recently took up an initiative to enter the insurance business. It has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Principal Financial Group, USA, and Vijaya Bank for joint ventures for insurance, pensions and asset management businesses. The bank has also signed an MoU with New India Assurance Company Ltd to act as its corporate agent for distributing non-life insurance products. By A Correspondent
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