Overhauling India's bloated and often sluggish state banks is critical for the government
India's top private banks might soon exit from the gold coin business.
AIBEA is part of United Forum of Bank Unions, the umbrella organisation of employee and officer unions of nine banks, which has given the call for one-day strike on January 7 and four days from January 21 in support of their wage hike demand pending since November 2012.
Banking operations across the country may be impacted on Thursday as some bank unions would be joining the one-day nationwide strike called by central trade unions. Ten central trade unions, except Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, will observe the nationwide general strike to protest against various policies of the central government. Many lenders, including IDBI Bank and Bank of Maharashtra, in regulatory filings on Wednesday said their normal working could be affected at the branches and offices.
Bank CFOs may meet next week to discuss minimum public shareholding and takeover rule issues.
Prospects of a bumper kharif harvest are expected to lower food inflation in the coming months, making the country's inflation outlook benign, the Union Ministry of Finance (FinMin) said in its monthly economic report for October released on Monday.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has identified "climate shocks" as a risk to food inflation rates and overall price rise while stating that the outlook for the country's economic growth remains bright. In its Annual Report for 2023-24, released on Thursday, the central bank said easing supply-chain pressures, broad-based softening in core inflation, and early indications of an above-normal southwest monsoon meant well for the inflation outlook in 2024-25. "The increasing incidence of climate shocks, however, imparts considerable uncertainty to the food inflation and overall inflation outlook," said the RBI while noting headline inflation moderated by 1.3 percentage points on an annual average basis to 5.4 per cent in 2023-24.
'The BJP has killed public anger. They have killed people's self-respect.'
Rajan said the RBI is working on upgrading the capabilities of its inspectors to undertake bank system audits as well as to detect vulnerabilities in them
'We face the risk of remaining a low-income country for a very long time unless something changes in the next few years.' 'Instead of constantly talking about becoming a developed economy, we need to start fixing the problems of the economy one by one.' 'There is so much potential, and we are squandering away the opportunity.'
Most of the lenders had informed their customers in advance about the strike call given by All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA), All India Bank Officers' Association (AIBOA), BEFI, INBEF, INBOC and Bank Karmachari Sena Mahasangh (BKSM), and its impact on banking services.
Banking services across the country were hit on Wednesday by the day-long strike by 10 central trade unions and 14 bank unions, but workers of largest lender SBI and a few other banks stayed off the agitation.
Corporation Bank is the biggest beneficiary of this round of capital infusion with Rs 9,086 crore of funding, followed by Allahabad Bank with Rs 6,896 crore.
The current situation in Kerala politics is perhaps best described as a case of the state's traditional two front politics now seeing a third front (the BJP) muscling in with the potential outcome being either a messy three front affair or a renewed endorsement of the two front pattern but with one of the old fronts compromised or quashed, observes Shyam G Menon.
A host of lenders, including State Bank of India, IDBI Bank, Indian Bank and Andhra Bank, have lined up meetings of their asset-liability committees this week, to review their lending and deposit rates.
A combination of factors, including heavy investments in US Treasury bonds and dollar sales at a healthy profit, facilitated the Indian central bank in transferring a record surplus of Rs 2.11 trillion to the government for 2023-24 (FY24). The RBI's dollar purchases increased in FY24, supported by robust capital inflows endorsing the economy's health.
The December meeting of the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI's) six-member Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) will start on Wednesday even as there is no clarity on whether Governor Shaktikanta Das, the chair of the panel, will continue in office after his term ends next week. The outcome of the meeting will be announced on Friday by Das at 10 in the morning.
A joint forum of central trade unions has given a call for a nationwide strike on March 28 and 29 to protest against the government policies affecting workers, farmers, and people.
Rajan sees banks passing on the benefit of lower rates regime to customers.
The central government has asked public sector undertakings to dissuade their employees from participating in the bandh.
He is expected to be produced before a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act court on Saturday where the ED will seek his remand for custodial interrogation.
rediffGURU Rohit Gupta, co-founder and COO of College Vidya, provides a list of competitive exams that can help you land a job in the public sector.
The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to examine a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking a judicial probe into the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack in which 26 people were killed.
A trends study conducted by India's Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) has expressed suspicion that cryptocurrency is being used across the country in serious criminal acts like terrorist financing, fuelling secessionist activities, cybercrime, narcotics trafficking, illegal betting and gambling. The report, which was based on suspicious transaction reports and operational analysis, shared these trends and credible intelligence with law enforcement agencies.
Nationalisation has served its purpose. It's time to move ahead, keeping majority ownership of the government in a few banks to serve the people, argues Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The government is looking to give Bharat Global Ports a certain amount of domestic exposure after it set up the state-owned consortium to increase India's global maritime heft, officials aware of the development said. The intended domestic exposure is meant to give the consortium experience and build its credentials for international projects.
This is the second all-India bank strike in as many months.
In all, 14 unions representing bank employees and officers will be supporting the day-long stir.
The Lok Sabha passed the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025, with the ruling NDA defending it as beneficial for minorities while the opposition called it "anti-Muslim". All amendments moved by the opposition were rejected and the bill was passed with 288 votes in favor and 232 against. Union Minorities Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju asserted that India is the safest place in the world for minorities, refuting claims of their insecurity.
'I hear that there are some 10,000 Indians stuck in Iran, including nearly 4,000 students from Kashmir. But, I do not know any of them. Here I am all by myself and the embassy has asked me not to venture out far from my hotel. People here are going about their daily lives despite the bombings'
The bosses of SBI, Union Bank and Central Bank have been driving down to their offices everyday to take stock of the biggest loan drive ever undertaken for MSMEs, discovers Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The next Census' findings will help identify the extent of India's ageing population and vulnerability levels.
In the Union Budget for Financial Year 2023-24 (FY24), Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had held forth on the need for better governance and investor protection in the banking sector. She had proposed certain amendments to the Reserve Bank of India Act (RBI Act), 1934; the Banking Regulation Act (BR Act), 1949; and the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1970.
At least 13 candidates are in the race for the position of managing director and chief executive officer (MD & CEO) of Punjab National Bank (PNB), the second-largest public sector bank (PSB), according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. "Among the candidates, some are executive directors (EDs) and managing directors in major PSBs. "Financial Services Institutions Bureau (FSIB) will conduct the interviews next month," said a source.
Amid a debate on the basis of a monetary policy stance, one may be curious enough to know how non-food retail inflation has behaved over the years in India. Let the eager souls catch a glimpse of facts. In the past 10 years, non-food inflation came down below 4 per cent on two occasions - pre-Covid period of 2019-20 and now in the first four months of the current financial year (FY25).
From the Sensex pack, Adani Ports & Special Economic Zones, Mahindra & Mahindra, Reliance Industries, HDFC Bank, Larsen & Toubro, NTPC, State Bank of India, UltraTech Cement and Kotak Mahindra Bank were the major gainers. In contrast, Tata Steel, Titan, Bajaj Finserv, JSW Steel, Bajaj Finance, Hindustan Unilever, ITC, Tata Motors and Tata Consultancy Services were among the laggards.
Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari has announced that the long-delayed Mumbai-Goa highway will be completed by June this year. He also revealed that a new toll policy will be announced within the next 15 days, which will eliminate physical toll booths across the country. Gadkari attributed the delay in the highway project to legal disputes and land acquisition issues. He expressed confidence in India's infrastructural future, stating that the country's road infrastructure will be better than that of the United States in the next two years.
'The snakes and ladders game will continue till the consolidation process is complete simply because we don't know how bad the scene is, with some of the banks being merged,' says Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The Reserve Bank on Wednesday allowed inbound travellers from G20 nations arriving at select airports to use the popular UPI for making payments in the country. Later, the RBI also proposes to extend the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) facility to travellers from all countries. UPI is a system that powers multiple bank accounts into a single mobile application, merging several banking features, seamless fund routing & merchant payments into one hood.
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