"SBI's corporate accounts group has firmly established itself for the entire gamut of banking needs of the top 200 corporates in India. As a next step, we are renewing our focus on the higher end of the retail segment through the personal-banking service, targeting the high net worth clients," SBI managing director and group head (national banking) SR Iyer said while inaugrating the bank's first first personal-banking boutique in Mumbai.

The minimum deposit size in these boutiques is pegged at Rs 10,000 for current accounts and term deposits and Rs 5,000 for savings accounts.

Senior SBI officials said there are already 38 such boutiques all over the country (four of which were opened on Thursday, to coincide with SBI's bank day) and the bank has decided to have 100 such boutiques by the end of 1999-2000. "The first personal bankingbranch was started in 1998, and has already turned profitable," they added.

"The personal banking boutique is our answer to the foreign and private sector banks in terms of ambience, technological infrastructure and a well trained, skilful and dedicated staff," Iyer said, adding that SBI aims at ensuring `emotional attachment' of its customers to these branches.

The SBI managing director said necessary training has been imparted to the staff, adding that trainers from SBI's 52 training centres across the country have been asked to `adopt' these branches, play the role of a `mentor for the staff' and continuously monitor their progress.

"We have also set an ambititous target for these personal banking branches of disbursing 50 per cent of the deposits mobilised by them. To this end, SBI is exploring options concerning special schemes for housing finance and other personal loans," Iyer said.

"Of the Rs 2,000 crore advances targeted for the current fiscal, around Rs 1,000 crore would be for the housingloans only and the SBI will soon be announcing a fixed-rate housing loan scheme (not linked to the bank's prime lending rate)," SBI deputy managing director Janki Ballabh told the Financial Express.