Bihar govt to move RBI on banks not opening targeted branches

The Bihar government will raise the issue of banks not abiding by the decision to open a branch having a population of 5,000 and above, with the Centre and RBI, state Finance Minister Abdul Bari Siddiqui today informed the Assembly.

In reply to a question, Siddiqui made the statement and said that against a target set to open 527 new branches in the state in the current financial year, only 166 branches had been opened so far.

He said the state government would also exert pressure for speeding up the process of opening bank branches in the next meeting of the State Level Bankers Committee.