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In an effort to make the best use of information technology in rural areas, Union Bank of India has now come out with a hub-and-spoke model to meet loan requirements.
Under this concept, 15-20 rural branches within a radius of 20 km are attached to a ‘Union Samridhhi Kendra’ in their vicinity. Loan leads generated by branch manager / business correspondents are taken over by the agriculture officers in the ‘kendra’ for further action.
Rajkiran Rai G, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Union Bank of India, who was in Mangaluru on Monday, said the bank, which has 16 Union Samridhhi Kendras in different parts of the country, will take the number to 30 by the end of March 2019.
How does it work
Explaining the model, Rai said if there is requirement for loans – farm loan, small business loan or vehicle loan – in the village concerned, the manager of the branch generates the lead such as the address and type of loan required.
Each kendra is equipped with around 15 agriculture officers. After the lead is updated at the Union Samridhhi Kendra, the Chief Manager in the hub assigns the lead to an agriculture officer in the kendra.
The agriculture officer, who visits the village, is armed with a tablet computer with geo-tagging facility.
The tab captures info on the type of crops, house, property, among others. Apart from this, the officer also scans the documents through the tab, and updates it online to the kendra, he said. The loan gets processed in two-three days, and the sanction goes directly to the branch concerned.
Stating that there is no question of delay, he said disbursement is done at the branch level, and there is no need for the villager to visit the Union Samridhhi Kendra.
Even the bank’s business correspondents in villages can generate leads for loan requirement in their areas. These business correspondents get commission for the leads thus generated.
The bank launched this concept six months ago. Before launching this, it had done a trial run for two months in Nashik and Karnal. Based on the response in these locations, the bank expanded it to other areas, he added.
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