the goan I network
PANAJI
After struggling with all kinds of financial and administrative difficulties, the state’s apex cooperative bank Goa State Co-operative Bank (GSCB), presently headed by a team of administrators, has made a remarkable turnaround and has earned a profit of Rs 17 crore.
After curtailing unnecessary expenditure and promoting business activities, the GSCB bank employees are now being advised ways to handle the functioning of the bank to obtain an ISO certificate.
The administrators at GSCB have been given a deadline till September, before the State’s Registrar of Cooperative Societies conducts elections to the bank’s Board of Directors (BoD).
After being hit by losses and difficulties, the BoD had offered to step down and the State government had a team of administrators, headed by noted chartered accountant V B Prabhu Verlekar and comprising Mohandas Ramdas and Shailesh Usgaonkar to steer the GSCB back into profits.
A M Chodankar is presently handling the bank’s affairs as Managing Director of GSCB.
A number of corrective steps were initiated by the team of administrators and the accelerated loan sanctioning process enabled the loan to increase from Rs 1,232 crore to Rs 1,454 crore, while advance deposit has reached 71 per cent.
An average of Rs 1.5 crore of loans are disbursed on a daily basis and recoveries have also been streamlined.
The administrators decided to curb unnecessary expenditure by dropping VIP culture like car services, AC offices, etc. and instead, decided to focus on boosting core banking services.
The administrators also stopped the practice of employees deliver letters across 58 branches and instead, entrusted the task to courier services and saving money in the process.
The Administrative Committee submitted its report to the Registrar of Co-operative Societies and the Registrar has extended the term of the committee till September, by which time the Board of Directors of GSCB will be elected.
“For the first time in its history, the GSCB has earned a profit of Rs 17 crore and has set a target of achieving a gross profit of Rs 30 crore by March 31, 2019,” Verlekar told The Goan.
“The bank will now be operated on a tight budget and we have stopped VIP culture of the bank. The bank is now working to getting ISO certificate and employees are being given guidance on this,” he added.
