Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Apr 10, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Apr 10, 2003 |
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Money & Banking
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Regional Rural Banks Kalpatharu Grameena Bank targets Rs 5-crore profit Our Bureau
BANGALORE, April 9 THE Kalpatharu Grameena Bank plans to wipe out accumulated losses of over Rs 2.75 crore and make a profit of Rs 5 crore this year. To this end, the bank is focussing on the non-farm sectors in the Bangalore Urban and Bangalore Rural districts where it operates, according to Mr T.R.S. Sarma, Chairman of the bank. "We believe extending finance and marketing support is crucial to rural development and will implement initiatives in this regard,'' Mr Sarma said. The grameena bank is also focussed on women-centric self-help groups as they are responsible and have been proved a successful model. With 81 branches in Tumkur, Bangalore Urban and Bangalore Rural districts, the Kalpatharu Grameena Bank is training its staff in commercial lending and focussed on improving productivity. "In the last few years, business per branch has gone up by Rs 185.2 crore, while per employee contribution has increased from Rs 53 lakh in 1999 to Rs 76 lakh in 2002,'' Mr Sarma said. In 2002-03, we expect the figure to touch 95 lakh, while per branch business is targeted at Rs 4.3 crore, he added. "Our spreads too have increased from 3.73 per cent in 2001 to 3.8 per cent in 2002 and we are focussed on reducing idle cash while increasing return on working funds,'' the chairman said. Disbursals by the Kalpatharu Grameena Bank have risen by 117 per cent in the last three years. In 2001-02, the bank disbursed close to Rs 75 crore.
The bank targets Rs 22 crore deposits while advances are expected to touch Rs 140 crore this year. "Disbursements are targeted at Rs 90 crore but we will also try to raise our recovery rates.'' Apart from improving productivity at the branches, the bank is also going in for computerisation. About a quarter of the bank's branches are expected to be computerised by the end of the year while the rest will follow, he said. An organisational development initiative has also been put in place at the bank in collaboration with the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) while the bank's activities are being promoted and publicised among existing and potential customers. In Tumkur district, most of the credit was to coir-related industries, granite processing, gold-covering units, food processing establishments and sericulture. In Kunigal, Ramanagaram and Kanakpura, sericulture activities were successful whereas most other taluks are farm dependent. "For instance, the groundnut crop in Koratagere, Pavgada, Madhugiri and Sira were abnormally low last year,'' the chairman said. While non-farm sector activities have considerable scope in Bangalore Urban and Bangalore Rural, Tumkur's rural economic activity is still largely farm-related, Mr Sarma says. To change this emphasis, the bank plans to focus on encouraging non-farm activity in the districts through training programmes and providing marketing support to customers.
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