Gujarat co-operative banks to link up with private, PSU bank ATMs

Now it's any time money for the about 80 lakh account holders of co-operative banks in Gujarat. In a bid to widen its ATM reach for its customers, the Gujarat Urban Co-operative Banks Federation (GUCBF) is attempting to link up the state's 300-odd urban and 18 district cooperative banks with the ATM network of private and nationalised banks.

"It is the first of its kind of project in India. We are trying to link up our ATM network with that of private as well as nationalised banks. This link up will help about 80 lakh account holders of cooperative banks to access anywhere in India. For this, we are talking with core banking provider to set up centralized data system," said Jyotindra Mehta, president, GUCBF and director of the Rajkot Nagrik Sahkari Bank.

According to Mehta, for safety purposes, there will be two centralised data systems. While the first one is likely to come up at Ahmedabad, the second one, which will serve as a backup system, will come up in some other state.

"Customers will get the power of withdrawing money anytime at any place while the banks will get a technical edge, for which cooperative bank are not that well-known," Mehta added.

Being aggressive about core banking, GUCBF earlier ran a project to interlink the all cooperative banks and technology upgradation. The project — the brainchild of the Gujarat Urban Co-operative Banks Federation (GUCBF) — is in its final stage and is expected to take off within a couple of months with the support of the state co-operative banks. Computers have been acquired by most of the banks and the staff training is over too. GUCBF is now in the process to invite tenders for application of the service providers.