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Established in 1911, Central Bank of India was the
first Indian commercial bank which was wholly owned
and managed by Indians. The establishment of the
Bank was the ultimate realisation of the dream of
Sir Sorabji Pochkhanawala, founder of the Bank.
Sir Pherozesha Mehta was the first Chairman of a
truly 'Swadeshi Bank'. In fact, such was the extent
of pride felt by Sir Sorabji Pochkhanawala that he
proclaimed Central Bank of India as the 'property of
the nation and the country's asset'.
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He also added that 'Central Bank of India lives on
people's faith and regards itself as the people's
own bank.
During the past 99 years of history the Bank has
weathered many storms and faced many challenges. The
Bank could successfully transform every threat into
business opportunity and excelled over its peers in
the Banking industry.
A number of innovative and unique banking activities
have been launched by Central Bank of India and a
brief mention of some of its pioneering services are
as under:
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1921 |
Introduction to the Home Savings Safe
Deposit Scheme to build saving/thrift habits
in all sections of the society. |
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1924 |
An Exclusive Ladies Department to cater to
the Bank's women clientele. |
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1926 |
Safe Deposit Locker facility and Rupee
Travellers' Cheques. |
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1929 |
Setting up of the Executor and Trustee
Department. |
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1932 |
Deposit Insurance Benefit Scheme. |
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1962 |
Recurring Deposit Scheme. |
Subsequently, even after the
nationalisation of the Bank in the year 1969,
Central Bank continued to introduce a number of
innovative banking services as under:
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1976 |
The Merchant Banking Cell was established. |
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1980 |
Centralcard, the credit card of the Bank was
introduced. |
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1986 |
'Platinum Jubilee Money Back Deposit Scheme'
was launched. |
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1989 |
The housing subsidiary Cent Bank Home
Finance Ltd. was started with its
headquarters at Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh. |
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1994 |
Quick Cheque Collection Service (QCC) &
Express Service was set up to enable speedy
collection of outstation cheques. |
Further in line with the
guidelines from Reserve Bank of India as also the
Government of India, Central Bank has been playing
an increasingly active role in promoting the key
thrust areas of agriculture, small scale industries
as also medium and large industries. The Bank also
introduced a number of Self Employment Schemes to
promote employment among the educated youth.
Among the Public Sector Banks, Central Bank of India
can be truly described as an All India Bank, due to
distribution of its large network in all 29 States
as also in 6 out of 7 Union Territories in India.
Central Bank of India holds a very prominent place
among the Public Sector Banks on account of its
network of 4695 Branches, 4 Extension counters,
along with 29 Satellite Offices (as on May 2015) at
various centres throughout the length and breadth of
the country. Customers' confidence in Central Bank
of India's wide ranging services can very well be
judged from the list of major corporate clients such
as ICICI, IDBI, UTI, LIC, HDFC as also almost all
major corporate houses in the country.
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