NUCFDC aims to double UCBs’ business in next five years: Mehta

Soon after the Ministry of Cooperation tweeted about the meeting of Secretary Ashish Kumar Bhutani with the NUCFDC team, Jyotindra Mehta, Chairman of NUCFDC, expounded at length on the roadmap for the Umbrella Organization of UCBs.

Talking to the Indian Cooperative, Mehta thanked the Ministry for its encouragement and unstinting support. He said, “There is a lot to do, and we are inching towards our goals one by one.”

In a tweet, the Ministry of Cooperation said, “Dr. Ashish Kumar Bhutani, Secretary, Ministry of Cooperation, held a meeting to review the progress of NUCFDC, the umbrella organization of urban cooperative banks. NAFCUB officials participated in the meeting in hybrid mode.”

Besides the Secretary, those present in the meeting from the government side included Pankaj Bansal and Ram Krishna. NAFCUB was represented by Jyotindra Mehta, Laxmi Dass, D Krishna, Atul Khirwadkar and Yogesh Gupta.

“Being a FINTECH company, we need to do business in a manner that enables each urban co-op bank—big or small—to double its business in the next five years,” said Mehta, underlining the factors crucial to the growth story of UCBs.

Mehta talked about new business avenues for the UCBs to raise their income. He discussed free bank income in this context and mentioned that smaller banks do not sell insurance and other schemes to their customers, unlike the bigger banks. NUCFDC aims to motivate them to do so, he added.

NUCFDC also intends to conduct regulatory inspections of UCBs, currently done by the RBI. The process involves a data dump that highlights any anomalies in the auditing or accounting aspects of the bank. “This way, we will be saving a lot of RBI’s time,” stated Mehta.

Most importantly, NUCFDC wishes to have a bargaining advantage when negotiating purchases for the UCB sector. “We are already talking to HP for a meaningful discount, as banks need to constantly upgrade their computers and desktops. So far, a single bank has been doing so, but now we will do it on behalf of 1511 banks,” emphasized Mehta.

“Our goal is to prevent the closure of any UCB. For this, we need to do two things urgently: raise the business of banks and increase their compliance. Since NUCFDC has come into being, we are focusing exclusively on these two aspects,” stated Mehta.

Currently, NUCFDC is busy appointing top posts, including professional CEO, CTO, CFO, and a Company Secretary. Being a Fintech company, we need to have the best talent to achieve our goals, added Mehta. NUCFDC has hired a globally acclaimed agency to help locate the right kind of talent, but Mehta will not disclose its name.