Chhattisgarh to get its own RBI branch

Chhattisgarh will have a separate branch of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) from the beginning of next calendar year.

The RBI Governor, Y V Reddy, made this announcement after meeting the state chief minister Dr. Raman Singh on October 11 evening.

An official communiqué of the state government quoting the RBI Governor said that RBI had accepted the request of the Chhattisgarh government and decided to open its branch in the state capital to create at the better environment for financial management.

Reddy, on a two-day Chhattisgarh visit ending today, said that the new RBI branch would begin functioning from January 1, 2007.

Singh thanked the RBI Governor and termed it as a new year gift for the people of Chhattisgarh.

Singh and the RBI Governor discussed the need for infrastructure development in the state and ways to boost growth of agriculture and industry in the state.

The RBI offices in Bhopal and Nagpur were so far monitoring the functioning of banks in Chhattisgarh.

Given the long distance of these branches from the state headquarters, the state government took the initiative to open the branch.

The chief minister wrote to the RBI for a branch in Raipur, asserting that it would ensure better inspection, observation and control over the commercial banks operating in the state.

Singh said he hoped that the opening of the RBI branch would solve the problems relating to supply of fresh currency notes and coins in the state.

Singh said that the separate RBI branch would be able to monitor better the working of rural co-operative banks, urban co-operative banks and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) besides providing sufficient agricultural credit to farmers.

The Chhattisgarh government also inked a memorandum of understanding with the RBI for strengthening co-operative banks in the state.

On behalf of RBI, executive director V S Das signed the MoU while secretary of the department of cooperatives, P C Dalai, represented the state.

RBI, under the MoU, would constitute a high-level task force comprising officials from RBI, Chhattisgarh government, senior officials from urban co-operative banks and co-operative department.

The task force would look into better arrangements for statutory audit at all the 14 Nagrik co-operative banks existing in the state through RBI's chartered accountants.

Besides, selection of candidates to head nagrik co-operative banks would also be done on the basis of RBI guidelines.

Of the 14 Nagrik co-operative banks operating in Chhattisgarh, eight banks had been placed in the grade three and four category, or the sick category.

The Central Board of Directors' (CBD) meeting of RBI also met here today.

The board reviewed the state of the nation's economy at the meeting, which was chaired by RBI Governor Y V Reddy and attended by deputy governors Rakesh Mohan and Usha Thorat.

The CBD of RBI reviewed the key economic, monetary and financial development of the country, sources said.

The main function of the CBD was to provide overall direction to its affairs.

This was the first time the RBI CBD meeting was organised in Chhattisgarh.