Said Canara Bank's chairman and managing director RJ Kamath: "We are working out an IT plan with NIBM. We started this process (IT plan) in Bangalore though our immediate destination was Delhi. But before we move to Delhi, we want to see whether the Bangalore-operation is working well".

Canara Bank has already formalised its plan for computerising its branches. As of now, 700 branches across the country has been computerised, out of which 235 are fully computerised. Eighty six branches in Mumbai are fully computerised out of the total 87 branches.

The bank has also reported a sharp increase in its net profit to Rs 124.58 crore for the first half of the current fiscal, up from Rs 77.52 crore during the corresponding period of the last fiscal.

Operating profit of the bank has increased to Rs 494 crore (Rs 318 crore) during this period. Global advances, including staff advances, stood at Rs 26,266 crore (Rs 24,914 crore) while domestic credit rose to Rs 25,740 crore (Rs 24,438 crore). Global deposits of the bank stood at 49,959 crore from the end-March 2000 figure of Rs 48,001 crore while domestic aggregate deposits increased to 48,387 crore (Rs 46,716 crore).

"The increase in net profit can be attributed to reduction in cost of deposits and cost of borrowing. The bank has done reasonably well to bring down its net-NPA level to 3.5 per cent. Last year, the net-NPA was five per cent of the net advances. The move to reduce the cost of deposits has helped to increase the net-profit level. Increase in its level of advances have also contributed to the performance", Mr Kamath said.

The chairman and managing director Kamath added that the bank has not finalised any plan to offer a voluntary retirement scheme (VRS). "Some of our branches are running short of man-power. This, when there is also excess manpower in some branches. So an effective re-allocation of staff may be the right movement. However, as per 1999-agreement about the VRS, we have to finalise this in the coming period".

Canara Bank has over 55,000 employees, and around 5,000 employees will be covered under the VRS. The bank has also made a move to send its union leaders in Pune to attend the NIBM seminar on VRS.

"This will lead to better understanding between the union leaders and the management of the bank. We are the first bank to make such a move", said Mr Kamath.

Canara Bank is also planning a foray into insurance, but the bank is to finalise its partner in this venture. The bank does not have any immediate plan to come with initial public offering. "The bank will think it over after watching how the stock-market behaves. We are actually waiting for a comfortable public sentiment about the market", Mr Kamath said.