Bengaluru: Bharatiya Mahila Bank on Saturday said it is targeting to have 150 branches across the country by the end of the current fiscal year (2015-16).
"We are expanding... We have 57 branches all over India. We may add another 70 odd branches... We propose to have 150 branches by March 2016," Bharatiya Mahila Bank CMD Usha Ananthasubramanian told reporters here.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Indian Women Network's conference organised by CII here, she said, "We are expanding in rural areas also."
The bank at present employs 400 people and has three branches in Karnataka.
Ms Ananthasubramanian said the bank as of now has about 1.6 lakh customers, with 82 per cent of them being women.
Stating that the bank's priority was to improve financial literacy among women, she said the lender provided "loans to women entrepreneurs to set up small businesses so as to become self-reliant".
Launched in 2013, Bharatiya Mahila Bank is the first of its kind in the country's banking industry, formed with a vision of economic empowerment for women.
Earlier speaking at the event on the topic 'Celebrating Women Leadership', Ms Ananthasubramanian made out a strong case for raising the number of women directors on the boards of listed companies.
Welcoming the Securities and Exchange Board of India's directive for inducting women directors on the boards of companies, she said, "...but then why just one. It pains to hear that there should be at least one woman director. Why not more? And, to think that there was even a penalty for non-induction of women directors."
"Surely, there was no dearth of competent, professionally qualified women who can take up such positions with ease," she added.
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