GIFT City May See 3-4 Foreign Banks Set up Shop Soon

Mumbai: Around three to four foreign banks are likely to soon set up shop at International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) in Gujarat's GIFT City and are waiting for the RBI to issue certain operating guidelines.

Currently, 11 domestic lenders including SBI, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bank of Baroda have opened their businesses at GIFT (Gujarat International Finance Tec-City). The financial transactions by these banks has crossed USD 8 billion.

"About three to four foreign banks are in cusp of setting up offices at GIFT city. RBI has to issue a final set of operating guidelines for them," GIFT city managing director and group CEO Ajay Pandey told reporters in Mumbai.

Without naming the foreign banks he explained that these lenders have sought clarity related to capital adequacy requirements.

Pandey noted that these banks have their own regulators in their respective homes and therefore certain norms need to be worked out with the host regulator, which is the RBI.

Meanwhile, GIFT city has so far generated over 7,500 jobs and is looking to cross the 9,000 mark by fiscal-end. The city plans to generate as many as one million jobs including 500,000 direct employment.

"We are very rapidly moving towards the 10,000 mark hopefully by the end of this year and thereafter it should double annually," Pandey said.

"Lot of the job generation would come from the domestic sector," he added.

GIFT city is an integrated development on 886 acres of land with 62 million square feet of built-up area which includes office space, residential, schools and hospitals. It also has a dedicated multi-services special economic zone (SEZ) for international operations for the services sector. The SEZ also has a status of India's first IFSC.