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Admitting that the ongoing Telangana agitation has seriously affected business of State Bank of Hyderabad, a top bank official said it has also impacted its proposed merger with the parent State Bank of India (SBI).
"Several branches had to be shut for several days, which has impacted our business and non-performing assets position," M Bhagavantha Rao, SBH Managing Director, told reporters here.
"The prolonged closure of branches had taken a toll on business as Andhra Pradesh as a whole was generating more than Rs 1 lakh crore business out of the total business of about Rs 2.2 lakh crore of the bank, Rao said.
The bank has nearly 550 branches in Telangana and 450 in the rest of Andhra Pradesh, he said, adding total business in Telangana was to the tune of Rs 65,000 crore, as it was handling funds involving government agencies.
The bank was aiming at a 20 per cent growth in deposits and 18 per cent in advances but was able to achieve only 14.5 per cent both in deposits and advances in the current fiscal (till December), he claimed.
The agitation has also impacted the plans for merger with SBI, which owns the entire share capital of SBH. "The merger is not on the cards as of now," Rao said.
Stating that SBH was focusing now on other states and MSMEs to boost growth, he said it has opened more than 60 branches outside Andhra Pradesh in this fiscal.
SBH, which declared 2013-14 as the year of MSME, has disbursed around Rs 5,500 crore for SMEs and targeted to disburse Rs 9,000 crore to the sector.
"We have a large question mark (over Andhra Pradesh) and that is why we are focusing on rest of Andhra Pradesh," Rao said, adding that loans totaling about Rs 700 crore,which were classified as NPAs, have been referred for Corporate Debt Restructuring).
