“My exit was a personal decision that I conveyed to the top management in August and since then I have been serving my notice period. The narrative of termination seems a deflection of operational lapses at the branch level issues,” Handa told Moneycontrol and BQ Prime.
Handa’s stepping down from his position comes at a critical point when the state-run lender is facing RBI heat over onboarding of new customers on its bob World app. Handa, who had been with BoB for ten years, was instrumental in setting up the BoB World app.
His exit has triggered a storm with the bank in its official communication terming it as “cessation to employment”.
Meanwhile, Bank of Baroda (BoB) on Saturday said there was very insignificant and immaterial financial implication of ‘bob World’ on the bank. The bank has terminated the services of head digital lending business Akhil Handa as part of actions initiated following regulatory steps taken by the Reserve Bank of India, BoB managing director Debadatta Chand said while announcing its quarterly numbers.
On October 10, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had directed BoB to halt onboarding fresh customers on its mobile application ‘bob World’ with immediate effect, citing material supervisory concerns.RBI had said that the action was based on certain material supervisory concerns observed in the manner of onboarding customers onto the application.Following the RBI’s action, the bank had suspended a few officials related to the alleged manipulation of ‘bob World’.
“Currently the bank is engaged with the regulator so it is difficult to share any data…very insignificant or immaterial impact is there,” he said.
The bank is complying with regulatory directions from the RBI, he said, adding, the bank is engaged with the regulator in terms of compliance with all the action points.
(With inputs from agencies)
