SBI earmarks Rs 3,000 cr for Mumbai

Mumbai: The State Bank of India (SBI) has earmarked Rs 3,000 crore under its development banking plan for the Mumbai circle in the next fiscal. Out of this corpus, SBI has planned to keep aside Rs 1,250 crore for personal advances, while the lending towards the small-scale industry (SSI) will be around Rs 500 crore.

SBI has also laid down a special scheme for small and marginal farmers. Under the scheme, a farmer can avail of advances up to Rs 2 lakh to buy lands. But no farmer can buy more than two hectares of non-irrigated land and one hectare irrigated land.

SBI has set a profitability target of 35 per cent from its Mumbai circle. It has set a target of 22 per cent growth in deposits and 19 per cent growth in advances. It has also earmarked Rs 750 crore for the housing sector.

In order to provide a one-stop shop, the Mumbai circle has proposed to offer insurance and investment-based products for its retail clients. SBI has also drawn up a project for railway commuters. Under this project, commuters can avail of monthly passes through its ATM services, installed at railway stations.

Says SBI general manager B Behera: The thrust will be on higher customer focus, better utilisation of technology and human resources development. This will be utilised to come up with new products and services with better delivery mechanisms.

SBIs Mumbai circle accounted for the banks 20-to-25 per cent total business. During the current fiscal, this circle introduced group insurance scheme for farmers. It has formed 5,402 self-help groups (SHGs). Out of these, 1,601 SHGs have a credit linkage of Rs 6 crore.

The bank has issued 38,488 Kisan Credit Cards involving a total credit of over Rs 84.5 crore. Recently SBI launched the Kisan Gold Card Scheme to take care of farmers investment needs.