J&K Bank chairman MY Khan said, "With Jammu and Kashmir being a disturbed state, we are faced with serious problems in credit disbursal. That is why we are focussing to expand our network beyond Jammu and Kashmir."

Deposits of the bank stood at Rs 9,422.09 crore at the end of March 2000, while advances stood at Rs 3,518.07 crore.

The bank has a low credit-deposit ratio of 37.34 per cent as compared to the banking industry's average of above 50 per cent. J&K Bank's 421th branch was inaugurated on Monday by Union Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Omar Abdullah. This is the bank's seventh branch in Mumbai and is fully computerised. It is a corporate-banking branch. "The inauguration of a corporate branch is in line with the recommendations of PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC) which has been appointed to formulate the bank's restructuring plan. We are looking to expand our business throughout the country not only in terms of size, but are also looking to provide quality service to customers. The board has approved the report and we have already started implementing the same," Mr Khan said.

The recommendations cover the area of organisation structure, business, asset liability management, etc. PWC recommended that the bank lend to the small sector as well, Mr Khan pointed out. The bank is also looking to increase its fee-based income, which is also in line with the PWC recommendations. The bank has tied up with Infosys to help in IT. Almost 80 per cent of its branches are computerised out of a total of 421 branches. It has 40 ATMs all over the country. "We would like to have 50 ATMs by end-March," J&K's chief general manager, PZ Lateef Ahmed said.

The bank is going to foray into the insurance sector with a four-way joint venture and will forward its application to Irda in the next couple of weeks. The venture will be in the nature of two partners and two investors. J&K Bank will hold 25 per cent stake in its insurance venture. According to Mr Abdullah, the devastating earthquake in Gujarat will not have much impact on the country's export in the next financial year. He said that the country has already exceeded its export growth target of 18 per cent. by achieving 20 per cent growth.