Oriental Bank of Commerce, established on 19 February, 1943, in Lahore (then a city of British India, and currently in Pakistan), is one of the public sector banks in India.Oriental Bank of Commerce made a modest beginning under its Founding Father, Late Rai Bahadur Lala Sohan Lal, the first Chairman of the Bank.Within four years of coming into existence, the Bank had to face the holocaust of partition. Branches in the newly formed Pakistan had to be closed down and the Registered Office had to be shifted from Lahore to Amritsar. Late lala Karam Chand Thapar, the then Chairman of the Bank, in a unique gesture honoured the commitments made to the depositors from Pakistan and paid every rupee to its departing customers. The foundation of customer service thus laid has ever since remained Oriental Bank's prime philosophy and has been nurtured well as a legacy by all its successors, year after year. The Bank has witnessed many ups and downs since its establishment. It has seen many upheavals in the 66 years of its existence and on every trying situation; it has emerged successful. The period of 1970-76 is said to be the most challenging phase in the history of the Bank. At one time profit plummeted to Rs.175, that prompted the owner of the bank, the Thapar House, to sell / close the bank. Then employees and leaders of the Bank came forward to rescue the Bank. The owners were moved and had to change their decision of selling the bank and in turn they decided to improve the position of the bank with the active cooperation and support of all the employees. Their efforts bore fruits and performance of the bank improved significantly. This was the turning point in the history of the bank. The bank was nationalized on 15th April, 1980. At that time total working of the bank was Rs.483 crores having 19th position among the 20 nationalised banks. Within a decade, the bank could turn over a new leaf to come out as the most efficient and best performing bank of the country. Today our Bank has progressed on several fronts, such as crossing the Business Mix mark of Rs.1.50 lacs crores, achievement of 100% CBS, reorienting of lending strategy through Large & Mid Corporates and establishment of new wings viz., Rural Development and Retail & Priority Sector. The Bank has to its utmost credit lowest staff cost with highest productivity in the whole of banking industry. But today there is stiff competition in the industry and challenges are at every front. If we want to survive and flourish in such a challenging environment, there is need for improvement in our NIM and in order to demonstrate robust growth & Profitable Balance sheet 2009, there is urgent & immediate need to address the following points by one and all:-
The Chairpersons (CMD)of the banks were as under:- Sl No Name Period 1 Shri Karam Chand Thapar 1946 to 1961 2 Shri L. M. Thapar 1962 to 1969 3 Shri R. P. Oberoi 1973 to 1976 4 Shri M. K. Vig 1976 to 1983 5 Shri P. S. Gopalakrishnan1984 to 1988 6 Shri S. P. Talwar 1988 to 1990 7 Shri S. K. Soni 1990 to 1996 8 Shri Dalbir Singh 1996 to 2000 9 Shri B. D. Narang 2000 to 2005 10 Shri K. N. Prithviraj 2005 to 2007 11 Shri Alok Kumar Misra 2007 to 04/08/2009 12 Shri T. Y. Prabhu 2009 onwards
Banks enjoys good reputation among customers due to its prompt and customer friendly services in comparison to other nationalised banks. Projects - A Handful of Success The Bank has launched yet another people's participation in the planning process at grass root level essentially to tackle the maladies of poverty. The Grameen Projects venture aims to alleviate poverty plus identify the reasons responsible for the failure or success.
OBC is already implementing a GRAMEEN PROJECT in Dehradun District (UP) and Hanumangarh District (Raiasthan). Formulated on the pattern of the Bangladesh Grameen Bank, the Scheme has a unique feature of disbursing small loans ranging from Rs. 75 (US $2) onwards. The beneficiaries of the Grameen Project are mostly women.The Bank is engaged in providing training to rural folk in using locally available raw material to produce pickles, jams etc. This has provided self-employment and augmented income levels thus reforming lives of rural folk and encouraging cottage industries in rural areas.
OBC launched yet another unique scheme christened 'The Comprehensive Village Development Programme' on the auspicious day of Baisakhi, the 13th of April 1997 at three villages in Punjab namely Rurki Kalan (Distt. Sangrur), Raje Majra (Distt. Ropar) and Khaira Majha (Distt. Jaladhar) and two villages in Haryana, namely Khunga (Distt. Jind) and Narwal (Distt. Kaithal). The pilot launch was a great success. Emboldened by the success, Bank extended the programme to more villages. At present, it covers 15 villages; 10 in Punjab, 4 in Haryana and 1 in Rajasthan. The programme focuses on providing a comprehensive and integrated package providing rural finance to the villagers with Village Development as its focus, thus contributing towards infrastructural development and agumentation of income for each farmer of the village. The Bank has implemented 14 point action plan for strengthening of credit delivery to women and has designated 5 branches as specialized branches for women entrepreneurs.
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