Process of recovery of dues from Kingfisher on: SBI chief

B D Narayankar reports 

Bangalore, Apr 26 (PTI) State Bank of India Chairperson
Arundhati Bhattacharya today said the process of recovery of
dues from Vijay Mallya-promoted Kingfisher Airlines is going
on, "but there are legal challenges."
        "Kingfisher is currently a non-operative account and we
don't want to discuss individual accounts. Whatever are the
steps necessary for recovery, they are going on, but there are
some steps that will take time because there is a legal system
to negotiate with, and obviously there are legal challenges.
So we are looking at that," she told reporters here.
        SBI leads a 17-member consortium of lenders that is
trying to recover dues running into over Rs 7,500 crore in
principal alone from Kingfisher Airlines. SBI has the maximum
exposure of Rs 1,600 crore to the airline, which has been
grounded since October 2012.
        Asked how much the bank has recovered from the sale of
Kingfisher Airlines' shares, she said, "Nothing very much. I
think the recovery is in the range of Rs 350 to Rs 400 crore."
        Asked about recovering the balance, she said, "I have
fully provided from our profits."
         SBI Capital Markets Ltd has been tasked by the
consortium of lenders to recover their dues.
        Punjab National Bank and IDBI Bank each have an exposure
of Rs 800 crore each to Kingfisher, Bank of India Rs 650 crore
and Bank of Baroda Rs 550 crore.
        Among the others, United Bank of India has Rs 430 crore,
Central Bank of India (Rs 410 crore), Uco Bank (Rs 320 crore),
Corporation Bank (Rs 310 crore), State Bank of Mysore, (Rs 150
crore), Indian Overseas Bank (Rs 140 crore), Federal Bank (Rs
90 crore), Punjab & Sind Bank (Rs 60 crore) and Axis Bank (Rs
50 crore).
        Lenders outside the consortium are Srei Infrastructure
Finance (Rs 430 crore), Jammu & Kashmir Bank (Rs 80 crore) and
Oriental Bank of Commerce (Rs 50 crore).
        On SBI's efforts to merge some of its subsidiaries,
Bhattacharya said the bank is not looking into it at the
moment and would see how things develop after the elections.
        "At this point of time, we are not really looking into
it. We will see how things go once the new government is
formed and we want to understand what they would like us to
do," she said.
        SBI and its associate banks already have the same
technology platform and accounting principles, she said.
Before going into the merger, the bank needs to align the HR
practices adopted by the associate banks, she said.
        She said SBI planned to expand its operations in rural
areas to ensure financial inclusion in the country.
        The hub and spoke system would be strengthened through
business correspondents to provide banking services in
villages, Bhattacharya said.
        The bank has 90,000 business correspondents now who reach
out to villages with mini-ATMs, accepting deposits, recovering
loans and providing withdrawal facilities, Bhattacharya said.
        She said more such banking services will be added in the
coming days.
        Speaking about corporate social responsibility, she said
the bank spent Rs 142 crore in 2012-13 for CSR.
        She added that 47,041 people were imparted vocational
training and 24,535 of them were either provided placement or
finance for self-employment ventures.