Its Business As Usual At Gtb

After the panic withdrawals on Thursday, Global Trust Bank (GTB) is back to normal. "It's business as usual in all our 100-odd branches throughout the country", the Sudhakar Gande, managing director, said at a news conference this evening.

He said the "panic" was confined to some belts in Hyderabad city alone and by a strategic decision to allow whoever wanted to withdraw his or her money from the bank should be allowed to do so, confidence could be restored. "We all worked till late last night and kept the branches open till the last depositor seeking withdrawal of his money was satisfied", he claimed.

 

Gande said while the panic withdrawals yesterday were confined to seven or eight branches in the city, some tension prevailed this morning in Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam branches also.

"We soon got over the problem and our customers were satisfied", he said.

The chief executive admitted that the panic was triggered off by several ATMs going out of cash yesterday. "We have learnt our lesson. We now know how to move cash around. We shall maintain liquidity so that such unfortunate situation is not repeated again", he said.

Gande still maintained that the draw on the bank yesterday was triggered by "some unscrupulous elements and vested interests spreading rumours". The bank was addressing itself on this question and would soon report to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). It would also resort to legal and other actions if these elements were identified.

To a question, he did not rule out the trouble having triggered "from internal sources". Nothing can be ruled out, he said.

He said the RBI had also vouched to the fact that GTB "does not have any liquidity or solvency problems" and it (RBI) does not have any regulatory concerns with the bank.

Anonymous e-mail created scare

An anonymous e-mail cautioning about the solvency 'problem' facing GTB to an employee of a pharma major, which had a salary (cream) account for its 2,000-odd employees with the bank, triggered the draw on the bank, according to a senior GTB executive.

"We are trying to get the e-mail and locate its origin", he said. GTB has 10 to 15 "cream" accounts of major corporates in the city and most of them are concentrated in and around the Kukatpally industrial belt from where the trouble started.