Two rural banks merged

The Krishna Gramin Bank (KGB) with Gulbarga as its headquarters and Pragathi Gramin Bank (PGB) with Bellary as its headquarters, both regional rural banks (RRBs), have merged into one entity and will now be called Pragathi Krishna Gramin Bank (PKGB). The new bank has come into existence from August 23 (Friday).

The KGB and PGB were sponsored by State Bank of India and Canara Bank, respectively. After the merger, SBI has lost its stake in KGB and the new bank is now fully sponsored by Canara Bank. The headquarters of the new bank will be Bellary, said PKGB chairman M G Bhat. The service area of the new bank will be the combined operational area of the erstwhile two RRBs namely, Bidar, Gulbarga, Yadgir, Raichur,
Koppal, Bellary, Chitradurga, Davangere, Shimoga, Kolar and Chikkaballapur districts.

Bhat said the shareholding of the new bank would continue to be in the earlier pattern: Union government 50 per cent, Canara Bank 35 per cent and Karnataka government 15 per cent. The new bank, with a network 602 branches, has a total networth of Rs 786 crore, with deposits of Rs 6,913 crore and advances of Rs 6,925 crore. It has a total turnover of Rs 13,838 crore.