Maharashtra based Kokan Mercantile Cooperative Bank has exceeded a business mix of Rs 1 thousand crore in the 2019-20 financial year and the management is trying to bring down the level of NPA.
During the visit of Indian Cooperative correspondent in Mumbai, the bank’s Vice-Chairman Asif Dadan accompanied by his CEO Sadanand K Nayak said, ” Our business is least affected by the Covid-19 pandemic and we tackled effectively whatever challenges came our way. As a result, our business mix has crossed Rs 1,000 crore and we aim to achieve more in the near future”.
“The deposits of the bank have grown from Rs 591 crore to Rs 597 crore and loans and advances increased from Rs 406 crore to Rs 426 crore which registered a growth of 5.04 percent in the 2019-20 FY. The total business of the bank increased from Rs 997 crore to Rs 1,023 crore as on 31st March 2020”, he said.
Dadan said we are focusing on adopting new technology and due to this we successfully met the challenges during the lockdown imposed in the country due to the coronavirus.
“To tell you the truth we were lucky that we had launched our Mobile Application namely Kokan Bank App in the month of January 2019 and due to this we could easily tackle the challenge of transferring funds”, he said. Presently we are getting good feedback and we are happy, he added with a sense of satisfaction.
The bank earned a net profit of Rs 1.33 crore in the 2019-20 financial year. “Our entire team is fully focused on recovering NPA loans so that our bank’s financial position will improve”, said the Vice-Chairman.
Our bank is also member of UPI. We have also provided Card Controller for debit card holders to fix and change limits on their cards through our App any time for ATM, POS, and Merchant transactions. We have also started Positive Pay app for high value clearing cheques to mitigate fraud risk, he added.
Though, majority of borrowers used to pay EMIs on time but due to Covid-19 and negative market conditions, many of them did fail resulting into delinquencies of assets classification. Now, we are asking our borrowers to clear the dues, Dadan underlined.
On the question of constituting BoM, Dadan said, “RBI should re-consider the formation of Board of Management in addition to board of directors. As when this was announced the banking regulation act was not amended but with the amendment now there is no need for constituting BoM”.
The reserve and other funds of the bank stood at Rs 118 crore as on 31st March 2020 as against Rs 107 crore of the last year. The working capital stood at Rs 754 crore as against Rs 747 crore of the last year and the paid-up share capital of the bank as at the year-end stood at Rs 16 crore.
Established in 1969 as a cooperative credit society by a small group of intellectuals and local businessmen as the Ratnagiri Mercantile Co-operative Credit Society with 105 members. Now the bank has a network of 25 branches in several states including Maharashtra, Karnataka, Goa and others.