India's banking sector has undergone a sea change over the years. Currently, the focus is increasingly being put on customer satisfaction and not just customer acquisition alone.
The global financial crisis that rocked most global economies did not have too much of an impact on Indian banks. Experts attribute this to the superior regulation that governs Indian banks.
With a host of private Indian and foreign banks jostling for customers in the Indian market, financial majors are wooing people like never before. So which is the bank that you trust most with your hard earned money?
In the following pages is a list of some of the top banks that have a successful track record in India (not all banks have been featured in this list because of space constraints).
Please take the poll at the end of the slide show and tell us which according to you is the top bank in India.
Kindly note that the banks mentioned in the following pages have NOT been ranked.
If you feel we have missed any, do feel free to mention it in the message board below.
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State Bank of India
Founded on July 1, 1955, State Bank of India is headquartered in Mumbai. SBI is the largest of the Big Four banks of India, along with ICICI Bank, Punjab National Bank and Canara Bank.
The Imperial Bank of India was rechristened the State Bank of India on April 30, 1955.
The bank's profit stood at Rs 2,914.20 crore (Rs 29.14 billion) for the first quarter ended June 2010.
The bank's chairman is O P Bhatt. The bank has about 300,000 employees currently.
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Vote: Which is the top bank in India
Photographs: Stringer India/Reuters
ICICI Bank
The Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India Limited was incorporated at the initiative of the World Bank, the Government of India, and the representatives of Indian industry in 1955. Over time, led by excellent management and good strategies, it turned into a universal bank.
Through technological and managerial push, the bank is now India's second-largest bank, second only to the mammoth State Bank of India.
ICICI Bank's profit stood at Rs 1,026 crore (Rs 10.26 billion) for the first quarter ended June 2010.
Key people: Chanda Kochhar, managing director and chief executive officer; KV Kamath, chairman; and N S Kannan, chief financial officer.
As of 2009, the bank had about 36,000 employees.
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Allahabad Bank
The bank began operations in 1865. Headquartered in Kolkata, it has 2,278 branches across the country.
Key person: J P Dua is the bank's chairman and managing director.
The bank has a branch in Hong Kong and a representative office in Shenzen, China too.
The bank's profit for the April-June 2010 quarter stood at Rs 347.14 crore (Rs 3.47 billion).
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Citibank
The Citibank was founded in 1812. It is headquartered in New York.
Key people: Vikram Pandit, chief executive officer; John Gerspach, chief financial officer; and John Ferderson, chief operating officer.
Citi reported losing $811 billion soon after Merrill Lynch announced that it too has been losing billions from the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States.
On April 11, 2007, the parent Citi announced major staff cuts and relocations. However, things started looking up gradually and in June 2010, Citigroup Inc posted a $4.43 billion profit.
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United Bank of India
Founded in 1950, the bank is headquartered in Kolkata.
Key person: Bhaskar Sen, chairman and managing director.
UBI was the result of the merger of four Bengal banks: Comilla Banking Corporation, Bengal Central Bank, Comilla Union Bank and Hooghly Bank (founded by Sri D.N. Mukherjee.)
The bank's net profit stood at
Rs 322.356 crore (Rs 3.223 billion) for the year ended March 2010..
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HDFC Bank
Headquartered in Mumbai, the bank has 1,725 branches.
HDFC Bank was incorporated in 1994 by Housing Development Finance Corporation Limited, India's largest housing finance company.
The bank reported that net profit stood at Rs 812 crore (Rs 8.12 billion) for te April-June 2010 quarter.
As of March 2010, the bank had 51,888 employees.
Key people: Jagdish Capoor, chairman; Aditya Puri, managing director.
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Bank of Baroda
Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad III set up Bank of Baroda in 1908.
The bank is headquartered in Mumbai.
Key person: M D Mallya is the bank's chairman and managing director.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 859.16 crore (Rs 8.59 billion) in the quarter ended June 2010.
The bank, along with 13 other major commercial banks of India, was nationalised on July 19, 1969.
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Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation
The bank originated in Hong Kong and Shanghai, where its branches were first opened in 1865.
It has about 8,000 offices in 87 countries and territories in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and South America and about 100 million customers.
As of 2009, the bank has about 302,000 employees.
The bank's net profit stood at $5.834 billion as of 2009.
Key people: Stephen Green (group chairman), Michael Geoghegan (group CEO).
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Canara Bank
Ammembal Subba Rao Pai, a philanthropist, established the Canara Bank Hindu Permanent Fund in Mangalore on July 1, 1906.
The bank changed its name to Canara Bank Limited in 1910 when it incorporated.
The bank is headquartered in Bengaluru.
Key people: A C Mahajan, chairman and managing director, and Jagdish Pai K L, executive director.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 1,013 crore (Rs 10.13 billion) for the quarter ended June 2010.
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Axis Bank
Axis Bank, formerly UTI Bank, is a financial services firm that had begun operations in 1994.
The bank is headquartered in Mumbai.
Key people: Adarsh Kishore, chairman and Shikha Sharma, managing director and chief executive officer.
The bank's net Profit stood at Rs 741.88 crore (Rs 7.41 billion) for the quarter ended June 2010.
As of 2010, the bank has 13,389 employees.
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Union Bank
Union Bank of India has assets worth $13.45-billion.
The bank is headquartered in Mumbai.
Key person: Mavila Vishwanathan Nair, chairman.
Union Bank was registered on November 11 1919 as a limited company in Mumbai. It was inaugurated by Mahatma Gandhi. At present, the bank has 25,630 employees.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 601 crore (Rs 6.01 billion) for the quarter ended June 2010.
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Standard Chartered Bank
Standard Chartered Bank is a British financial services company headquartered in London.
It operates in more than 70 countries and employs 80,000 people.
The name Standard Chartered comes from the two original banks from which it was founded and which merged in 1969 -- The Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China, and The Standard Bank of British South Africa.
The bank's 1st half profit stood at $3.12 billion.
Its key people are John W Peace, chairman of the board, Peter A Sands, chief executive officer.
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Corporation Bank
Corporation Bank was founded in 1906 in Udupi, Karnataka. Headquartered in Mangalore, the bank has about 13,000 employees.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 333.78 crore (Rs 3.33 billion) for the quarter ended June 2010.
Corporation Bank completed 100 years of existence on March 12 2006.
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Punjab National Bank
It was founded in Lahore in 1895.
Headquartered in New Delhi, the bank employees about 580,300 employees.
The bank has about 5000 branches across 764 cities of India.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 1,135 crore (Rs 11.35 billion) as of March 31, 2010.
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IDBI Bank
The Industrial Development Bank of India Limited was founded in July 1964.
Key person: R M Malla, chairman-cum-managing editor.
The bank has 8,989 employees at present.
The bank's net profit stood at Rs 251 crore (Rs 2.51 billion) in June 2010.
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Federal Bank
The bank was founded in Kochi in 1945.
The bank's key people are chairman Prof. A M Salim and managing director and chief executive officer M Venugopalan.
As of July 2010, the bank had 708 branches and 751 automated teller machines around the country.
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