IDBI Bank to focus on retail, priority sectors

At a meeting held on Thursday, Rabinarayan Panda, Field Chief General Manager, Chennai Zone, remarked that while 201617 posed challenges, the bank’s major thrust would be on rebalancing the business portfolio in coming months. The bank will tap into emerging opportunities to grow its business, with a vision to propel the retail and priority sector books notably.      

Panda says, “In fact, the bank has made headway as evidenced in the rising share of retail advances to 43 per cent as at endMarch 2017 from 33 per cent as at end-March 2016. The Bank’s Current and Savings Account (CASA) deposits as well as Retail Term Deposits both grew by over 22 per cent during the year. Also, the share of these two deposits increased to over 31 pc and 32 pc, during the year.” 

The bank has also set its sight on a few short-term goals. 

Panda explains, “The recovery of bad loans and prevention of further slippages will be a priority area for the bank in the short term. The bank will look at reducing its operational cost and it may raise about Rs 5,000 crore by selling non-core assets in the current fiscal.” 

Giving a breakup of figures in the Chennai Zone, Panda says, “The Chennai Zone has 116 retail branches with Rs 16,863 cr of retail business. The CASA and Retail Term Deposits registered a strong growth of 39 pc and 25 pc respectively during the FY 201617. The Structured Retail Loan Portfolio has grown by 8 pc. The Priority Sector Loan Book of the zone stands at 73 pc as against the prescribed 40 pc. The Advance to Agriculture sector and Micro Segment constitutes 36 pc and 28 pc respectively. Gross NPA in Structured Loan Portfolio stands at 1.28 pc. The Zone has chalked out plans to grow all its books by more than 25 pc and contain the Gross NPA at below 1% level in structured retail assets during the FY 201718.” The Bank’s NPAs was pegged at Rs 45,000 cr.