Bhatt to take over as IBA chief next week

State Bank of India (SBI) Chairman Om Prakash Bhatt is set to take over as the new chairman of the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA).

The present chairman, M V Nair, who is the chairman and managing director of Union Bank of India, and the senior most banker chief, will relinquish the post next week. IBA officials said that last year, at the time of taking over the post Nair had made it clear that he did not want to do more than a term since he wanted to focus on the bank’s operations.

Bhatt will be in charge of IBA till he retires in March, 2011.

It is after four years that chairman of the country’s largest bank will also be at the helm of IBA, a lobby group for the industry.

In 2005-06, A K Purwar, who was then the chairman of SBI also headed IBA. After Purwar, IBA has seen four chairman, including present deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) K C Chakrabarty, who leaded the association for only for few days. He then moved to Mint Road.

IBA, which currently have 159 member banks, acts as an important link between banks, regulator and the government. During Nair’s term the industry group completed and implemented industry-wide wage negotiations including a second pension option for public sector bank employees.