Punjab National Bank

History

Punjab National Bank was registered on 19 May 1894 under the Indian Companies Act, with its office in Anarkali Bazaar, Lahore present day Pakistan. The founding board was drawn from different parts of India professing different faiths and a varied back-ground with, however, the common objective of providing country with a truly national bank which would further the economic interest of the country. PNB's founders included several leaders of the Swadeshi movement such as Dyal Singh Majithia and Lala Harkishan Lal, Lala Lalchand, Shri Kali Prosanna Roy, Shri E.C. Jessawala, Shri Prabhu Dayal, Bakshi Jaishi Ram, and Lala Dholan Dass. Lala Lajpat Rai was actively associated with the management of the Bank in its early years. The board first met on 23 May 1894. The bank opened for business on 12 April 1895 in Lahore.

PNB has the distinction of being the first Indian bank to have been started solely with Indian capital that has survived to the present. (The first entirely Indian bank, Oudh Commercial Bank, was established in 1881 in Faizabad, but failed in 1958.)

PNB has had the privilege of maintaining accounts of national leaders such as Mahatma Gandhi, Jawahar Lal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi, as well as the account of the famous Jalianwala Bagh Committee.

Timeline

In 1900, PNB established its first branch outside Lahore in India. Branches in Karachi and Peshawar followed. The next major event occurred in 1940 when PNB absorbed Bhagwan (or Bhugwan) Dass Bank, which had its head office in Dehra Dun.

At the Partition of India and the commencement of Pakistani independence, PNB lost its premises in Lahore, but continued to operate in Pakistan. Partition forced PNB to close 92 offices in West Pakistan, one-third of its total number of branches, and which held 40% of the total deposits. PNB still maintained a few caretaker branches. On 31 March 1947, even before Partition, PNB had decided to leave Lahore and transfer its registered office to India; it received permission from the Lahore High Court on 20 June 1947, at which time it established a new head office at Under Hill Road, Civil Lines in New Delhi. Lala Yodh Raj was the Chairman of the Bank.

In 1951, PNB acquired the 39 branches of Bharat Bank (est. 1942). Bharat Bank became Bharat Nidhi Ltd. In 1960, PNB again shifted its head office, this time from Calcutta to Delhi. In 1961, PNB acquired Universal Bank of India, which Ramakrishna Jain had established in 1938 in Dalmianagar, Bihar. PNB also amalgamated Indo Commercial Bank (est. 1932 by S. N. N. Sankaralinga Iyer) in a rescue. In 1963, The Burmese revolutionary government nationalized PNB's branch in Rangoon (Yangon). This became People's Bank No. 7. After the Indo-Pak war, in September 1965 the government of Pakistan seized all the offices in Pakistan of Indian banks. PNB also had one or more branches in East Pakistan (Bangladesh).

The Government of India (GOI) nationalized PNB and 13 other major commercial banks, on 19 July 1969. In 1976 or 1978, PNB opened a branch in London. some ten years later, in 1986, the Reserve Bank of India required PNB to transfer its London branch to State Bank of India after the branch was involved in a fraud scandal. That same year, 1986, PNB acquired Hindustan Commercial Bank (est. 1943) in a rescue. The acquisition added Hindustan's 142 branches to PNB's network. In 1993, PNB acquired New Bank of India, which the GOI had nationalized in 1980. In 1998 PNB set up a representative office in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

In 2003 PNB took over Nedungadi Bank, the oldest private sector bank in Kerala. At the time of the merger with PNB, Nedungadi Bank's shares had zero value, with the result that its shareholders received no payment for their shares. PNB also opened a representative office in London. In 2004, PNB established a branch in Kabul, Afghanistan, a representative office in Shanghai, and another in Dubai. PNB also established an alliance with Everest Bank Limited in Nepal that permits migrants to transfer funds easily between India and Everest Bank's 12 branches in Nepal. Currently, PNB owns 20% of Everest Bank. Two years later, PNB established PNBIL – Punjab National Bank (International) – in the UK, with two offices, one in London, and one in Southall. Since then it has opened more branches, this time in Leicester, Birmingham, Ilford, Wembley, and Wolverhampton. PNB also opened a branch in Hong Kong. In January 2009, PNB established a representative office in Oslo, Norway. PNB hopes to upgrade this to a branch in due course. In January 2010, PNB established a subsidiary in Bhutan. PNB owns 51% of Druk PNB Bank, which has branches in Thimpu, Phuentsholing, and Wangdue. Local investors own the remaining shares. Then on 1 May, PNB opened its branch in Dubai's financial center. PNB purchased a small minority stake in Kazakhstan-based JSC Danabank established on 20 October 1992 in Pavlodar. Within the year PNB increased its ownership till 84% of what has become JSC (SB) PNB, with its share currently decreased to 49%. The associate in Kazakhstan now called JSC Tengri Bank has branches in Almaty, Astana, Karaganda, Pavlodar and Shymkent. September 2011: PNB opened a representative office in Sydney, Australia. December 2012: PNB signed an agreement with US based life Insurance company Metlife to acquire a 30% stake in MetLife's Indian affiliate MetLife India Limited. The company would be renamed PNB MetLife India Limited and PNB would sell MetLife's products in its branches. | assets = ₹6,435 billion (US$96 billion) (2015)

Listings and shareholding

PNB's equity shares are listed on Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange of India. It is a constituent of the CNX Nifty at the NSE.

Employees

As on 31 March 2015, the bank had 68,290 employees. As of 31 March 2013, it also had 919 employees with disabilities on the same date (1.45%). The average age of bank employees on the same date was 46 years. The bank reported business of INR 11.65 crores per employee and net profit of INR 8.06 lakhs per employee during the FY 2012-13. The company incurred INR 5,751 crores towards employee benefit expenses during the same financial year.

Awards and recognitions

Initiatives

The bank incurred INR 3.24 crores on CSR activities like medical camps, farmer trainings, tree plantations, blood donation camps etc. during the FY 2012-13.