SS Mallikarjuna Rao, MD and CEO, Punjab National Bank (PNB), has assured the employees that no jobs will be slashed following the merger of the Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) and Union Bank of India (UBI) with PNB.
The 1.03 lakh strong workforce of PNB, according to Rao, will only grow as the business grows. Rao revealed that PNB plans for Qualified Institutional Placement (QIP) by the end of Q3 or in the beginning of Q4, and that PNB will not be seeking governmental aid in terms of infusing capital.
The three banks were amalgamated with effect from April 2020 leading to the creation of India’s second largest nationalised bank in terms of branches and business.
In the first quarter, when a net loss was expected, PNB reported a net profit of Rs 308 crore, and the provisions fell by 1.5 per cent during the June quarter. In alignment with the with RBI’s decision of on one-time loan restructuring, PNB had sought restructuring of about five to six per cent of its loan book. By the end of June 2020, the size of PNB’s loan book was Rs 7.21 lakh crore, of which Rs 1.27 lakh crore lies in the MSME category, where 14 per cent is under the non-performing assets (NPA) category.
