SBI flayed for shifting branch control to Jammu

Srinagar, April 19 (IANS) The State Bank of India's (SBI) decision to shift the administrative control of all its branches in south Kashmir districts to Jammu attracted a lot of flak Thursday from the bank's customers and the general public here.

In a statement issued to the media, the customers of the bank in south Kashmir districts of Anantnag, Shopian, Pulwama and Kulgam alleged that the decision of the SBI authorities to create a separate regional office for these branches in the state's winter capital would cause hardships to the public.

In a recent decision, the country's premier bank has decided to create a separate regional office for the administrative control of the bank's branches in the Ladakh region and districts of Shopian, Pulwama, Anantnag in the Valley and Doda district of the Jammu region.

"Instead of establishing the proposed regional office in Srinagar, the bank has decided to establish the regional office at Jammu.

"While most of the branches coming under the administrative control of the proposed office exist in the Valley," the statement said.

Many customers, especially fruit growers and businessmen customers of the SBI in south Kashmir have expressed fears that their credit proposals would now be delayed inordinately as the sanctioning office would operate from outside the Kashmir Valley.

The main administrative offices of the SBI together and all other nationalised banks were shifted out of the Valley with the beginning of the separatist armed campaign here in 1990s.

Despite the return of normalcy in the Valley, most of the senior level administrative offices of the SBI and other nationalised banks including the country's central Bank, the Reserve Bank of India are still to be shifted back to the Valley.