The merger of SBH with SBI three months ago has brought with it a piquant situation in the management of regional rural banks which also went by the name of Grameena Banks.
The reorganisation of districts in October last year has made the situation all the more complex.
It so happened that the merger of SBH with SBI meant amalgamation of all regional rural banks sponsored by SBH with SBI. But, the SBH sponsored banks in the name of Telangana Grameena Bank with 397 branches and the SBI’s 498 branches in the name of AP Grameena Vikas Bank continue in the same names. As a result, two different rural banks functioned though the sponsored bank was SBI alone.
New districts
To make matters worse post-reorganisation of districts, the operations of the two banks overlapped in the same district. For instance, Kadthal was part of erstwhile Mahbubnagar district but it is now in Ranga Reddy district.
The APGVB which operated in Kadthal continued in Ranga Reddy where TGB also functioned. Similarly, the two banks also functioned in Warangal (Urban) district as the TGB functioned from Elkaturthi and APGVB in Hasanparthy though the two villages were only eight kms apart. The regional banks were established by the Central government in 1975 to provide basic financial and banking services in rural parts. Each district had a bank and a network of branches in a single name.
Common sponsor
That was how Kakatiya Grameena Bank in Warangal, Satavahana bank in Karimnagar, Sangameswara in Mahbubnagar and so on came up. But, the sponsoring bank had multiple operations across districts. Subsequently, a committee appointed by the Centre recommended that all banks with a common sponsor be brought under one fold.
Therefore, the 498 branches of five banks sponsored by SBI in the erstwhile districts of Nalgonda, Warangal, Khammam, Mahbubnagar and Medak were converted into APGVB. The 397 branches of another five banks sponsored by SBH in the remaining districts of Nizamabad, Karimnagar, Adilabad, Ranga Reddy and Hyderabad were named TGB.
Bank employees
Now, the demand of rural bank employees was to amalgamate APGVB with TGB as the State was bifurcated. The APGVB was established on April 1, 2006 with SBI as the sponsoring bank which also had operations in Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Visakhapatnam. Incidentally, the banks in these districts are also headquartered in Warangal while the TGB was headquartered in Hyderabad.
