ICICI to pump in Rs 500 cr for making Jaipur Northern hub

Jaipur, Nov 30: Country's largest private sector bank ICICI today said it will invest Rs 500 crore in a phased manner to make the city its Northern hub which will accomodate about 20,000 people.

''We will invest Rs 500 crore to make Jaipur our Northern hub which will give employment to about 20,000 people,'' ICICI Managing Director and CEO K V Kamath told reporters at the two-day 'Resurgent Rajasthan-Partnership Summit' here.

In the first phase, the bank will employee about 5,000 people which will later be increased to 20,000, Mr Kamath said.

The increased Number of employees will be used in the financial services fuction of the ICICI group nationally and internationaly.

He said the bank will also scale up its headcounts by two times in the state, as it plans to open its branch in every district.

At present, ICICI Group has its Southern hub in Hyderabad and Western hub in Ahmedabad. Its Eastern regional hub for back office operations, coming up at Chandaka industrial estates in Bhubaneswar, will be commissioned in 2009.

Industry chamber Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has partnered the state government in the summit which is being attended by about 700 delegates.

''We are in discussion with several education institute in Rajasthan to bring industry and academia partnership. We hope to cover about 20 educational institutes through this initiative with rollout starting next month at Maharani and Commerce College under University of Rajasthan as well as in the agriculture university,'' Mr Kamath said.

The Group had earlier signed an MoU with Utkal University and KITT for offering skill-enabling and vocational courses in the domain of banking, finance and insurance.

UNI