State Bank of India (SBI), the largest public bank in India, will open two new branches in Sri Lanka this week, extending the services to the island nation’s Northern Jaffna peninsula and Eastern port district of Trincomalee where India is already dominating.
Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will inaugurate the new branches during her three-day official visit, the Indian government said in a statement.
SBI, the largest bank in India with over 20 percent market share by assets, has been in Sri Lanka for more than 150 years, serving both corporate and retail clients.
India has been expanding its businesses into Sri Lanka’s North and East after the end of a 26-year war in 2009.
India has already built a Cultural Centre in Jaffna, once the de facto capital of separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), where predominantly ethnic minority Tamils are living. Tamils are more close to South Indian Tamil Nadu state by culture and language.
India, one of the World’s fastest growing economies, has already got an oil tank farm in the Eastern port district of Trincomalee and is involved in more than a third of fuel business by volume in Sri Lanka.
Trincomalee is also rich in mineral mines.
Currently SBI Sri Lanka is operating through 5 branches namely Fort & FCBU branches at main building in fort, Colpetty branch, Wellawatta branch and Kandy branch.
SBI Sri Lanka has the product range from all types of deposit accounts, financing working capital, term loans, vehicle loans, housing loans and trade finance.