BoI to spread e-Grama kiosks network across Karnataka

Mangalore, Feb 18 (UNI) In a bid to take the benefits of Information Technology to the villages, public-sector Bank of India would finance 1500 kiosks under the e-Grama Project to set up kiosks across the Karnataka state.

Disclosing this at a press conference Bank Chairman and Managing Director M Balachandran said here last night that the bank had already extended finance for setting up of 162 such centres in Davangere, Mysore and Belgaum districts. The new kiosks would come up in Bidar, Haveri, Chitradurga, Gulbarga, Tumkur, Bangalore rural and Bijapur districts. The setting up of these kiosks would be done by NGOs, he said.

The centres under e-Grama project would help educate rural masses about banking facilities, besides extending the benefits of distance education and various other information. So far 65,000 families had been covered under the project at a cost of RS 150 crore. The bank would disburse a further Rs 500 crore for expanding the network during the next three years, he said.

Mr Balachandran said Bank of India had a total deposits of Rs 1900 crore in the state and the total advances stood at Rs 2500 crore. The thrust would be on priority sectors like Agriculture, CME, exports and infrastructure projects financing. It had taken an extensive lending on farm loans to sugarcane farmers through various sugarcane factories.

The bank had also identified four villages for intensive financing for integrated development in Karnataka like Malalkere in Davangere district, Attavara in Hassan, Kukdoli and Bugate Alur in Belgaum district.

It had opened five more branches this year in the state to take its branch network to 71. Three more had been planned to be opened by March this year and five more in the coming months, he said.

The bank, which now had 24 overseas branches, proposed to open another branch in Belgium and a fully owned subsidiary branch in Tanzania. It had got approval to set up a branch in South Africa and proposed to open representative offices in Dubai, Doha, Dhaka and Johannesburg, for which approval was expected shortly. It also had two outlets in China, the CMD added.

UNI