Department of Posts scouts for payments bank CEO, COO

The Department of Posts has written to chiefs of several public sector banks asking them to nominate officials to fill the posts of chief executive officer and chief operating officer at the department’s payments bank, which is to be unveiled soon.

“We have written to select public sector banks like Punjab National Bank, Canara Bank, Bank of Baroda, Bank of India (and) Union Bank to recommend their board-level officers or senior executives who may be interested in managing our payments bank as CEO on one-year deputation basis,” Department of Posts Secretary, S.K. Sinha, said.

The Secretary clarified that a similar request was not sent to State Bank of India to avoid conflict of interest as country’s largest lender has partnered with Reliance Industries, which has been granted a payments bank licence by the Reserve Bank of India.

March deadline

Since the government has set a March 2017 deadline for launching the payments bank's operations, the department wants to bring in top management quickly. The formal process of appointing a full-time CEO and COO will be initiated simultaneously, for securing approvals from competent authorities, including the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet.

Mr Sinha said: “We expect the board of IPPB to be in place within 30 to 45 days. If we get the name of the CEO, then we can have the board running.”

The India Posts Payment Bank (IPPB) will have 650 branches across the country.