Chairman of the State Bank of India, Dinesh Khara on Saturday in an exclusive interaction with ETBFSI, on the Paytm crisis said SBI is reaching out to Paytm customers through its subsidiary SBI payments.
“We will provide all the support to merchants and offer QR scan code, POS machines etc for the industry to not suffer at large,” he said.
Speaking on the blueprint, Khara said, We may not take the stake in the Paytm because we will have to review all the balance sheets and valuation among other aspects.”
“But acquiring merchants is what we are working,” he said.
It is worth highlighting here that on the day of RBI notification on Paytm, founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma had said, “We believe in partnership of the banks and we will be able to see to the same in the next few days.”
Vijay Shekhar Sharma had said One97 Communications Ltd (OCL) already works with various other banks and Paytm Payments Bank was one of the key banks. From here on the company is clear that it will work with various other banks and not Paytm Payments Bank Ltd (PPBL).
In the evening of December 31, RBI released a notification stating that it has directed Paytm Payments Bank Ltd (PPBL or the bank) to stop onboarding of new customers with immediate effect.
The Comprehensive System Audit report and subsequent compliance validation report of the external auditors revealed persistent non-compliances and continued material supervisory concerns in the bank, warranting further supervisory action, RBI said in a statement.
In another major development, as reported by Reuters, Enforcement Directorate (ED) will probe Paytm Payments Bank if any fresh charges of fund siphoning are found.
The Revenue Secretary Sanjay Malhotra told Reuters on Saturday that if there are any fresh charges of money laundering against Paytm by RBI, those will be investigated by Directorate of Enforcement as per the law of the land.
