New Delhi: The State Bank of India (SBI) has plans to hire about 12,000 personnel and add nearly 250 new branches to its network in the ongoing financial year, chairman C S Setty has said.
“In terms of recruitment, I think we would be looking at around 11,000 to 12,000 appointments across both clerical and officer cadres this year. This number may vary depending on retirements and emerging requirements, but I expect we should close the year with around 12,000 recruitments,” he told PTI.
“Last year, we have done fairly large recruitment because we took 1,500 specialist IT officers. This year, we do not need such a large number on the IT (information technology) side,” he said.
SBI is among India’s largest employers, with a workforce of over 2.45 lakh employees as of March 2026.
In 2025-26, SBI had hired 4,640 officers, 19,340 associates, and 1,653 contractual staff, taking the total number of hires to 25,633, as per the bank’s annual report for FY26.
Despite having a large network, there is still some white space in many areas; where new colonies are coming up or even in commercially active districts, the bank’s presence can be improved, Setty said on the branch expansion side.
“We also are looking at rationalisation of some of the branches, which means that our number broadly will be growing by maybe 200 to 250 per year on the net side,” he said.
The chairman, while speaking about stake dilution in the National Stock Exchange (NSE), said SBI and its subsidiary SBI Capital Markets Ltd together plan to dilute up to 1 per cent stake through the exchange’s proposed Rs 30,000-crore initial public offering (IPO).
“We are participating in that divestment. We propose to divest 0.65 per cent and 0.35 per cent by SBI Capital Markets because both of us hold the stake. So together, about 1 per cent as an SBI group… it could be less depending on any other shareholders joining,” Setty said.
SBI currently holds a 3.23 per cent stake in the NSE, while SBI Capital Markets owns 4.33 per cent in the country’s largest stock exchange.
The NSE received regulatory approval for the long-awaited Rs 30,000-crore initial public offering (IPO) last week. This could potentially be the country’s biggest-ever yet.
The NSE IPO will surpass Hyundai Motor India’s Rs 27,858.75-crore listing in 2024 as well as LIC of India’s Rs 20,557.23-crore offering in 2022. It will also dwarf Paytm’s (One97 Communications) Rs 18,300-crore (2021), Tata Capital’s Rs 15,511.87-crore (2025) and Coal India’s Rs 15,200-crore (2010) listing.
There is no monetisation plan for other subsidiaries in the immediate future, the chairman said.
SBI, along with its foreign partner Paris-headquartered Amundi, diluted around a 10 per cent stake in SBI Mutual Fund, including pre IPO, in July. The Rs 11,675-crore monetisation by the country’s biggest fund house was a huge success as the issue was subscribed 41.66 times.
Post-listing, SBI’s holding declined to 55.56 per cent from 61.86 per cent, while Amundi’s stake reduced to 32.63 per cent, down 3.7 per cent.
