Pratip Chaudhuri to head SBI; three new MDs appointed

Pratip Chaudhuri has taken over as the new chairman of State Bank of India, the state-run SBI said in a statement late on Thursday. He replaces O P Bhatt, who retired last month.

Chaudhuri, 57, has been working with State Bank for 37 years. He was deputy managing director (international banking group) before taking up the top role.

In fact with the departure of Bhatt, the country's biggest lender has got a whole new team at the top. Three new managing directors – Hemant Contractor, Diwakar Gupta and A Krishna Kumar – have been appointed along with Chaudhuri.

The three were also deputy managing directors earlier. Contractor was the bank's chief financial officer, Gupta handled national banking and Krishna Kumar was responsible for deployment of information technology.

This is the first time that SBI, which accounts for nearly a quarter of the banking business in the country, will have four managing directors, taking the number of executive directors on the bank's board to five.

R Sridharan, the most senior MD, is due to retire at the end of June, and the government is reportedly looking for a replacement.