Mr. O.P. Bhatt started his banking career with State Bank of India in 1972. Mr. O.P. Bhatt has, during 36 years with SBI, held several important assignments in India and abroad including a stint at the Bank's London Office, followed by assignments in the Bank's computerization project and later as Regional Manager at Jaipur and then as Executive Secretary to the then Chairman of the SBI Group.
He then was the Bank's Representative in Washington DC, where Mr. Bhatt' liaised with FRB, FDIC, US Exim, Indian Embassy, American banks, World Bank, IMF. He also arrangied money market lines for our foreign offices, arrangement of syndicated/ project finance loans etc.

Mr. Bhatt has held a number of critical senior management positions, first at Lucknow, later at the Bank's North East Circle and then in Travancore with a subsidiary of the State Bank of India.

As Chairman, Mr. Bhatt is not only the Chief Executive of India's largest commercial bank, he is also the Head of the entire State Bank Group which consists of 8 domestic and 5 international banking subsidiaries, besides 10 non-banking subsidiaries, and 2 Joint Ventures. Besides chairing these companies, Mr. Bhatt is also the Chairman of the Banking & Financial Institutions Committee of FICCI, Director on the board of several other companies like EXIM Bank and GIC and a member of the Boards of ICRIER, XLRI, IBPS, IDRBT, KVIC and National Co-operative Development Corporation.

Mr. Bhatt took over the reigns of the State Bank of India at its most critical and challenging time. The process of liberalization and globalisation of the Indian economy had already begun, bringing with it both opportunities and threats. With his deep knowledge of the market, both domestic and international, his close grasp of IT related issues, his hands-on approach to execution, and his proven ability to plan and strategise, Mr. Bhatt began a process of consolidating the Bank's strengths, innovating new products and taking effective steps to ensure that technology, human resources and business processes are harnessed towards expansion and deeper penetration of the market, both domestic and foreign.

Mr. Bhatt was nominated the “Banker of the Year” by Business Standard and CNN-IBN Indian of the Year for Business in 2007. The Bank has, under the leadership of Mr. Bhatt, steadily improved its Global ranking in the list of Fortune 500 companies and is, incidentally, the only Indian bank listed.

This is only an excerpt of the impressive CV of my Bhatt.

See also: 05:00 pm 'Growth of Indian Economy and Opportunities in Financial Sector'