Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective
Canara Bank
Third largest public sector bank in India From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Remove ads
Canara Bank is an Indian public sector bank based in Bengaluru. Established in 1906 at Mangalore by Ammembal Subba Rao Pai, the bank was nationalized in 1969. Canara Bank also has offices in London, Dubai and New York.[3]
Remove ads
History
Summarize
Perspective
Ammembal Subba Rao Pai, a philanthropist, established the Canara Hindu Permanent Fund in Mangalore, India, on 1 July 1906.[4]
Canara Bank's first acquisition took place in 1961 when it acquired Bank of Kerala. This had been founded in September 1944 and at the time of its acquisition on 20 May 1961 had three branches. The second bank that Canara Bank acquired was Seasia Midland Bank (Alleppey), which had been established on 26 July 1930 and had seven branches at the time of its takeover.[5]
In 1958, the Reserve Bank of India had ordered Canara Bank to acquire G. Raghumathmul Bank, in Hyderabad. This bank had been established in 1870, and had converted to a limited company in 1925. At the time of the acquisition G. Raghumathmul Bank had five branches.[6] The merger took effect in 1961.[7] Later in 1961, Canara Bank acquired Trivandrum Permanent Bank. This had been founded on 7 February 1899 and had 14 branches at the time of the merger.[7]
Canara Bank acquired four banks in 1963: the Sree Poornathrayeesa Vilasam Bank of Thrippunithura, Arnad Bank of Tiruchirapalli, Cochin Commercial Bank of Cochin, and Pandyan Bank of Madurai. Sree Poornathrayeesa Vilasam Bank had been established on 21 February 1923 and at the time of its acquisition it had 14 branches. Arnad Bank had been established on 23 December 1942 and at the time of its acquisition had only one branch. Cochin Commercial Bank had been established on 3 January 1936, and at the time of its acquisition had 13 branches.[7] Pandyan Bank was established at Madurai, Tamil Nadu, by S.N.K. Sundaram on 11 December 1946. It created an all-women's branch at Town Hall Road, Madurai in 1947, staffed by ten women, one of whom was Kamala Sundaram, S.N.K. Sundaram's daughter. The merger with Canara Bank took effect on 2 December 1963. At the time of the acquisition, Pandyan Bank had 83 branches.
The Government of India nationalised Canara Bank, along with 13 other major commercial banks in India, on 19 July 1969. Karkala Pulkeri Janardhan Prabhu (KPJ Prabhu) served as chairman of the bank post nationalisation. In 1976, Canara Bank inaugurated its 1000th branch. In 1985, Canara Bank acquired Lakshmi Commercial Bank in a rescue.
In 1996, Canara Bank became the first Indian Bank to get ISO certification for "Total Branch Banking" for its Seshadripuram branch in Bangalore. Canara Bank has now stopped opting for ISO certification of branches.
On 30 August 2019, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that Syndicate Bank would be merged with Canara Bank. The proposed merger would create the fourth largest public sector bank in the country with total business of ₹15.20 lakh crore (US$180 billion) and 10,324 branches.[8][9] The Board of Directors of Canara Bank approved the merger on 13 September.[10][11] The Union Cabinet approved the merger on 4 March 2020. The merger was completed on 1 April 2020 with Syndicate Bank shareholders receiving 158 equity shares in the former for every 1,000 shares they hold.[12][13][14][15][16][excessive citations]
In 2024, Canara Bank raised $300 million through its IFSC Banking Unit.[17]
Remove ads
Shareholding
As of June 2025, the promoter holding at the bank is 62.93% and the public holding is 37.07%.[18]
Subsidiaries
Domestic subsidiaries
- Canfin Homes Limited (CFHL)- A network of 110 branches and 28 satellite offices throughout India[19]
- Canbank Factors Limited[20]
- Canbank Venture Capital Fund Limited[21]
- Canbank Computer Services Limited[22]
- Canara Bank Securities Limited[23]
- Canara Robeco Asset Management Company Limited[24]
- Canbank Financial Services Limited
Joint ventures
Foreign branches
Overseas subsidiaries
- Canara Bank (Tanzania) Ltd.[25]
International wealth management
Since 1983, Canara Bank has been responsible for the management of Eastern Exchange Co. WLL,[26] Doha, Qatar, which Abdul Rahman M.M. Al Muftah established in 1979.[27]
Regional rural banks
Canara Bank sponsors two regional rural banks (RRB):
Its headquarter is at Malappuram and it operates in all districts in Kerala. It was established in 1976 as a Scheduled Commercial Bank.[28][non-primary source needed]
- Karnataka Grameen Bank
Its headquarter is at Bellary, Karnataka, and has 1751 branches spread over all districts in Karnataka. It established on May 1, 2025 under the "One State, One RRB"[29] policy of government of India.
Remove ads
Development projects
Canara Bank partnered with UNEP to initiate a solar loan program.[30]
Overseas operations history
Canara Bank established its international division in 1976. In 1983, Canara Bank opened its first overseas office, a branch in London. Two years later, Canara Bank established a subsidiary in Hong Kong, Indo Hong Kong International Finance. In 2008–2009, Canara Bank opened its third foreign operation, this one a branch in Shanghai. Later Canara Bank established a branch each in Leicester and Bahrain, and converted its Hong Kong subsidiary into a branch. Canara Bank incorporated its subsidiary in Tanzania as CBTL in 2015.
Remove ads
Controversies
On 6 June 2018, the UK division of Canara Bank was fined £890,000 ($1.2 million) by the UK's Financial Conduct Authority and was blocked from accepting new deposits for around five months for systematic anti-money laundering (AML) failures.[31]
Canara Bank faced a monetary penalty of Rs 2.92 crore from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) due to non-compliance with regulations, including failures in linking interest rates of loans to external benchmarks and other operational norms.[32]
In 2024, Canara Bank officers were recorded verbally abusing employees for not meeting their work targets, and the videos circulated on social media, prompting the bank to address these incidents publicly.[33][34]
Remove ads
See also
References
External links
Further reading
Wikiwand - on
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Remove ads