The government on Sunday revised the pay scale and allowances of employees of regional rural banks (RRBs) and brought it on a par with the nationalised banks. The move will put an additional cost burden of Rs 791 crore on the exchequer in the form of arrears. Announcing the wage revision on Sunday at the annual review meeting of RRB chairmen and general managers of sponsor banks,finance minister Pranab Mukherjee asked the RRBs to pull down their non-performing assets (NPAs) below 5% by this year itself. He asked the RRBs to speed up their activities using new technologies like business correspondents,mobile banking vans and tele-banking. Mukherjee also laid emphasis on expanding the core banking solutions platform of the RRBs. The total loan outstanding of RRBs as on March 31,2010,stood at Rs 83,562 crore whereas the deposits amounted to Rs 1,42,814 crore. The ground-level credit flow of RRBs grew 30% to Rs 56,268 crore from Rs 43,367 crore. fe
