Even after spending an exhausting day at Mundra Port in Gujarat, Om Prakash Bhatt is as sprightly as ever. Arriving in a black T-shirt, the 57-year-old boss of India’s largest commercial bank, State Bank of India (SBI), looks smart and immediately apologizes for being a few minutes late.
“Don’t ask me the brand of my T-shirt; I don’t know. My wife buys my clothes,” Bhatt says, as we enter Jewel of India at Nehru Centre, Worli. This is hardly surprising. Bhatt is a busy, hands-on man. A firm believer in the adage “seeing is believing”, he often visits ports, factories and even a business process outsourcing unit. “You must know who you are lending money to, and the competition. This is the best way to know your borrowers and their industry,” he says.
Bhatt likes red wine but orders a Laphroaig to give me company. “I hope you’ll like its smoky taste,” he says, and calls for the bottle to check the age of the single malt whisky.
Hard taskmaster: Bhatt is an expert at getting the best out of his staff. (Jayachandran / Mint)
Bhatt is one of the few chairmen of SBI to have got a five-year stint. Ironically, banking was not his first choice for a career. He joined the bank as a probationary officer only after he proved to be “underage” to appear for the Indian Administrative Service. Did he know that he would eventually head the bank one day? A postgraduate in English literature, Bhatt first says “it’s luck” and then, almost as an afterthought, adds: “I have all along been hard-working, innovative and a team person. I can relate to people well.”
And for a reluctant recruit, Bhatt has performed remarkably well. Within a year of taking over as chief general manager of the bottom-ranked north-eastern circle of SBI, Bhatt lifted the circle to the No. 1 position.
In his next assignment as the managing director of the State Bank of Travancore, Bhatt changed the profile of a traditional traders’ bank into a retail bank and aggressively sold mutual fund and insurance products. The State Bank of Travancore is one of the seven associate banks of SBI and many SBI bosses, including Bhatt’s predecessor A.K. Purwar, were groomed for the top position at these banks.
His route to the top of SBI, though, was anything but a cakewalk. Bhatt became a managing director of SBI after a keenly fought run-off with four of his colleagues—all belonging to the same batch of probationary officers. All five were interviewed in September 2005, three months before the managing director’s post fell vacant, but Bhatt got the government nod in April 2006. “Although I was an SBI representative in the US, people who wanted to block my way dubbed me as a liaison officer,” says Bhatt.