State Bank of India Chairman Rajnish Kumar said on Tuesday that FY21 will be a challenging year for the bank like any other bank or financial institution as the pandemic is still playing out.

However, SBI is well prepared to deal with such challenges, he told shareholders in a speech at the bank’s annual general meeting.

“A strong liability franchise with a customer base of over 44 crores, a diversified loan portfolio with strong capabilities to originate, digital leadership across channels, and legacy stress fully identified and suitably provided are some of the key strengths that your bank will rely upon in the post-Covid scenario,” said Kumar.

The SBI chief observed that the bank has stepped up its monitoring of all the projects under implementation, and expects to tide over Covid impact in the short to medium term.

Cost reduction

According to Kumar, the focus going forward will be on cost reduction, rationalisation and reskilling of workforce, improving staff productivity, and redeployment of workforce from administration offices to sales roles.

Further, the bank will maintain a constant vigil on the emerging stress and take proactive action, to help its borrower customers and maintain asset quality.

Following the global best practices, Kumar said SBI will institute Work from Anywhere (WFA) infrastructure to facilitate work from any location, while taking care of the social aspects of work-life balance.

This measure is expected to save ₹1,000 crore through cost optimisation and will be a key component of SBI’s business continuity during the pandemic, he added.