Punjab National Bank history, profile and history video

 Punjab National Bank operates as a commercial bank in India. The bank’s products include personal banking, savings fund account, current account, fixed deposit schemes, credit schemes, doorstep banking services, cards, nomination facilities, traders finance, agricultural banking, loan against future lease rentals, exim finance, cash management services, gold card scheme for exporters, money transfer schemes and world travel card. Its financial services include, insurance business, mutual fund, merchant banking, wealth management services and nse market tracker. The bank also provides services, which include issuance of pass book, cheque book, automated teller machine, debit cards, internet banking services and E-bay. It operates through four business segments, which include Treasury, Corporate and Wholesale Banking, Retail Banking and Other Banking Operations. The company also offers life and non-life insurance services, mutual funds, merchant banking services, application money blocking services and depository services. Punjab National Bank was founded on April 12, 1895 and is headquartered in New Delhi, India.“

“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. 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. Ironically, the PNB Website now claims Lala Lajpat Rai to be the founding father, surpassing Rai Mul Raj and Dyal Singh Majithia. 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, 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

• 1900: PNB established its first branch outside Lahore in Rawalpindi. Branches in Karachi and Peshawar followed.
• 1940: PNB absorbed Bhagwan Dass Bank, a scheduled bank located in Delhi Circle.
• 1947: 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, 33% of the total number, 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 in New Delhi.
• 1951: PNB acquired the 39 branches of Bharat Bank (est. 1942); Bharat Bank became Bharat Nidhi Ltd.
• 1960: PNB again shifted its head office, this time from Calcutta to Delhi.
• 1961: PNB acquired Universal Bank of India and amalgamated Indo Commercial Bank (est. 1932 by S. N. N. Sankaralinga Iyer) in a rescue.
• 1963: The revolutionary government in Burma nationalized PNB’s branch in Rangoon (Yangon), which became People’s Bank No. 7.
• September 1965: After the Indo-Pak war the government of Pakistan seized all the offices in Pakistan of Indian banks. PNB also had one or more branches in East Pakistan(Bangladesh).
• 1969: The Government of India (GOI) nationalized PNB and 13 other major commercial banks, on 19 July 1969.
• 1976 or 1978: PNB opened a branch in London.
• 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.
• 1986: PNB acquired Hindustan Commercial Bank (est. 1943) in a rescue. The acquisition added Hindustan’s 142 branches to PNB’s network.
• 1993: PNB acquired New Bank of India, which the GOI had nationalized in 1980.
• 1998: PNB set up a representative office in Almaty, Kazakhstan.
• 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.
• 2004: The next year, PNB established a branch in Kabul, Afghanistan and a representative office in Shanghai. PNB also established an alliance with Everest Bank 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.
• 2004: PNB opened a representative office in Dubai.
• 2006: Two years later, PNB established PNBIL – Punjab National Bank (International) – in the UK, with two offices, one in London, and one in South Hall. Since then it has opened more branches, this time in Leicester, Birmingham, Ilford, Wembly, and Wolverhampton. PNB also opened a branch in Hong Kong.
• January 2009: PNB established a representative office in Oslo, Norway. PNB hopes to upgrade this to a branch in due course.

In 2010, PNB purchased a small minority stake in Kazakhstan-based JSC Dena Bank. Within the year PNB increased its ownership and now PNB owns 84% of what has become JSC (SB) PNB. The subsidiary has branches in Almaty, Astana, Kangandu, and Pavlodar. Dena Bankwas established on 20 October 1992 in Pavlodar.

Also, 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.

• 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.”

*Information from Forbes.com and Wikipedia.org

**Video published on YouTube by “ Punjab National Bank“