HDFC Bank carves out rural banking business as a separate vertical

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], May 19 : India's largest private sector lender HDFC Bank on Thursday said it has carved out rural banking function as a separate vertical, which will be focused on increasing penetration in remote parts of the country.
Tasked to take banking products further in the hinterland, Rural Banking will consolidate the bank's existing initiatives in this direction, and take it closer to the last mile, HDFC Bank said in a statement.
Carved out of Retail Branch Banking as part of the bank's 'Future - Ready' project, the Rural Banking business to focus on semi-urban and rural areas, a large part of which remains untapped.
Anil Bhavnani, who has been with the bank for over 19 years, has been appointed National Rural Banking Head.
The Bank has at present 50 per cent of its 6,342 branches in semi-urban and rural areas, and the remaining 50 per cent in metro and urban areas. The bank also works with Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLE) of Common Service Centres (CSC) as an extension of the bank's branches in far-flung areas.
"We are excited to take the bank's world-class products and services to the remotest corner of India," said Anil Bhavnani, Sr Executive Vice President and National Rural Banking Head, HDFC Bank.
"This is both a challenge and an opportunity and I am very excited to take this up. For many years now, the bank had 50 per cent of its branches in semi-urban and rural areas. With this enhanced focus, we will open more branches this financial year in Semi-Urban and Rural areas. While branches are touch-points, we are working on meeting rural needs holistically, by creating products specially designed for these markets," Bhavnani added.