Public sector banks and corporate governance

Ten out of 11 nationalised banks don't have a chairman. Most bank boards don't have adequate number of non-official directors

Last week, Shanti Lal Jain took over as managing director and chief executive officer (MD & CEO) of the Chennai-headquartered Indian Bank. A few days before that, the Appointments Comm­ittee of the Cabinet extended the tenure of MDs and CEOs of three public sector banks (PSBs) — S S Mallikarjuna Rao (Punjab National Bank), Atul Kumar Goel (Uco Bank) and A S Rajeev (Bank of Maharashtra). The tenure of 10 executive directors (EDs) of seven PSBs was also extended.

Gone are the days when the government would take time to announce such appointments. In the not-so-distant past, after P S Jayakumar