In a major restructuring exercise, the State Bank of India (SBI), the largest lender of the country, has created a separate FI&MM vertical within the Bank with an exclusive focus on Financial Inclusion & Micro markets in rural and semi urban areas to improve customer experience in the hinterland.

Under this, the Bank will offer loans predominantly for agriculture and allied activities, and micro and small enterprises.

About 8,000 branches in rural and semi urban areas have been identified for providing specialised services to the micro segment including micro credit for small businesses and farmers. The thrust is also to improve service quality and availability of banking services through the Bank’s network of over 63,000 Customer Service Points in rural, semi urban, urban & metro areas. The new Vertical will provide a boost to the micro-finance sector.

Launching the Vertical, Rajnish Kumar, Chairman, SBI said: “The key elements of creating the FI&MM vertical are to bring sharper focus to different business lines and improve the quality of interaction with customers at the Branch. This is a key initiative by SBI to cater to financial requirements of people residing in the hinterland of the country, as part of its financial inclusion journey. The new FI&MM Vertical will provide an opportunity to serve the small business, Agri & allied segment so that they can run their businesses smoothly, especially in the current times of uncertainty.”

At the national level, the FI&MM vertical will be headed by deputy managing director (DMD) Sanjeev Nautiyal.

To ensure special focus and smooth functioning at the local level, the FI&MM Vertical will comprise of a four tiered structure under the Chief General Manager, General Manager, RMs at Regional Business Offices (RBO) and District Sales Hub to strengthen the credit delivery system and improve the turnaround time for quick sanctions and disbursement of small loans.

The primary emphasis will be on consolidating the district level presence which will provide constant sales & recovery support to branches in the FI&MM Network. The DSHs will also play an important role in strengthening the reach of Customer Service Points (CSP) and ensure improvement in quality & availability of services rendered to customers.

Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the SBI has been at the forefront in providing relief to existing SME borrowers, such as 10 per cent of fund based working capital limits by way of CCECL (Common COVID 19 Emergency Credit Line), easing of working capital finance along with moratorium on term loans and working capital.