With a growth target of just about 20%, public sector banks may not have big business plans for 2010-11, but they have nonetheless big hiring plans.

A back of the envelope calculation shows that the 27 public sector banks led by the country?s largest commercial lender, State Bank of India, will recruit 15,000 officers and 50,000 clerks this fiscal. While SBI itself will add around 4,500 officers and 25,000 clerks, its six associate banks will hire another 1,700 officers. SBI will need more officers keeping with its plans to add 1,000 branches.

?Even with a powerful technology platform and higher productivity, the bank needs to recruit larger number of staff to manage its growing business,? says OP Bhatt, chairman, State Bank of India, which has a customer base of over 24 crore.

The country?s third largest PSU lender, Bank of Baroda (BoB), is planning to recruit 3,500 people, including 2,000 officers. It plans to visit various campuses to recruit 500-600 officials. ?I think recruitment should be a constant process. Moreover, we are going to hire from institutes located in tier II towns and a large number of people are joining us now. Last year, we recruited 1,500-1,800. We have recruited 200 people from institutes like IIM and IITs for our treasury and credit departments,? says MD Mallya, chairman & managing director, BOB.

Bank of India (BoI), which is witnessing a 5% attrition among its officers, will recruit 2,000 officers and another 2,000 clerks in 2010-11. Another Mumbai-based public sector lender, IDBI bank, is planning to hire 2,500 to 3,000 in 2010-11.

According to Allahabad Bank chief JP Dua, the bank will recruit nearly 2,000 people, including 1,000 officers. ?The idea is to take care of the attrition rate that is hovering at 4% in my bank?s case and retirement of the existing staff,? he says.

AP Shukla, general manager & head (HR), Central Bank of India, says his bank is planning to recruit 600-800 persons at officer level and another 600-700 persons at clerical level during 2010-11 as against 1,550 (700 officers and 850 clerical) recruited during 2009-10.

?Further, we are also planning to recruit 100 persons directly from various campuses to fill up special requirements like risk management and treasury,? he says, adding, ?We also want to improve our per employee business to Rs 7.5 crore from the current level of Rs 6.97 crore.?