Tamal Bandopadhyay: Formula One driver

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Even before the dust settled down on the Centurion takeover, the entity became Centurion Bank of Punjab (Centurion-BoP) by taking over Bank of Punjab. Now, Centurion-BoP is in the process of overseeing the merger of the Kerala-based Lord Krishna Bank with itself.

This is typical of Sabre Capital Worldwide Chairman, Gurvinder Singh Rana Talwar, who has been engineering all these mergers and acquisitions. His personal stake in Sabre is well above 50 per cent. Patience has never been a virtue for the 56-year-old former CEO of Standard Chartered Plc. He was, in fact, instrumental in five acquisitions for Standard Chartered Plc in one year (1999-2000).

Meanwhile, Sabre is working on other fronts too. The Sabre Abraaj Private Equity Fund, floated by a joint venture of Sabre and the Dubai-based Abraaj Capital for private equity investments in India, plans to raise about $300 million. It will invest in both listed and unlisted entities in real estate, pharmaceuticals, retail and infrastructure space. Sabre also has a joint venture with Alexandra Fund Management, owned by Temasek Holdings of Singapore, for mutual fund business. The asset management company is set to float its first scheme before the end of the year.

"Rana is a respected banker with a very deep knowledge of the key Asian markets," Standard Chartered Chairman Sir Patric Gillam said in October 1998 when Talwar was elevated to the post of group chief executive replacing Malcom Williamson. Three years later, in November 2001, Sir Gillam's blue-eyed boy fell from grace and lost the board's confidence. Nobody knew for sure what went wrong, some say too much aggression had cost him his job.

He began his acquisitions in April 1999 when Standard Chartered picked up UBS' non-Swiss trade finance for $205 million. It was followed by buying 75 per cent stake in Nakornthon Bank in Thailand for $330 million September 1999 and Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce's emerging markets business for $1 billion and Metropolitan Bank in Lebanon "" both in February 2000. Finally, there were Chase Manhattan's card business in Hong Kong for $1.32 billion and Grindlays' business in India, West Asia and South Asia for $1.34 billion. Days before his ouster Talwar announced his bank's plan to expand in China and Taiwan.

In January 2003, Talwar had told Business Standard: "We are here to look at all troubled institutions. We have the capital and management expertise. We can go to any extent, depending on the deal." If he walks the talk, the man behind Citibank's great push for consumer finance before his innings at Standard Chartered, can give the local players a run for their money when it comes to taking over the old PSUs.