For the proposed Post Bank of India, the Union government has decided to sanction Rs 1,300 crore to meet its capital requirements. Although Post Bank does not intend to open a bank branch in each post office, the plan is to use postmen to meet the financial inclusion goal. According to the plan, Post Bank will have 50 branches in the first year, which will be increased to 150 by the fifth year. The branches will be located in select Head Post Offices in Tier-1-4 centres and select Sub-Post Offices in Tier-5-6 centres.
A strong Post Bank is seen to be the biggest challenge to existing public sector banks, including State Bank of India, which controls 70% of the banking business in the country. SBI, the largest lender, has a little less than 15,000 branches, while there are over 1.5 lakh post offices across the country.
To meet RBI norms, the postal department proposes to set up a new entity – Post Bank of India – that will have an independent board and separate operations. Apart from independent directors, the board will have representatives from the finance ministry and the postal department. Separate recruitment has been planned to have specialist bankers.
While converting the entire postal network would have meant a capital requirement of over Rs 60,000 crore, by setting up a special entity, the fund requirement has been reduced.
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