Bank employees getting more productive: RBI study
11 Jan 2010
Employees of Indian banks have become more productive over the last few years, according to Reserve Bank of India figures released last week.
Its report titled A profile of banks 2008-09 says that the average business and profits per employee for Indian banks more than doubled in the five years from 2004-05 to 2008-09.
The improvement was due to business growth outpacing the growth in manpower. Indian banks registered a total business growth (advances plus deposits) of 135 per cent from 2004-05 to 2008-09, while the branch network grew by 21 per cent. But their employee strength went up only by 10 per cent.
The decline in employee base of PSBs during this period was due to a good portion of the workforce getting superannuated and the implementation of a voluntary retirement scheme in 2000 to rationalise the workforce. More than 1.26 lakh employees of 26 banks were given the VRS option.
Punjab National Bank, Canara Bank and Central Bank of India have seen their employee strength fall the most among PSBs.
IDBI Bank, Corporation Bank and Oriental Bank are the top three public sector banks in terms of productivity. IDBI Bank has business per employee of Rs20 crore even as it added around 5,600 employees during 2004-09. Corporation Bank also increased its manpower by 2,200.