SBI to hire around 16,000 people every financial year and open 200-300 branches in FY26: Chairman

The country’s largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) will hire 16,000 employees in the current financial year and hire a similar number of employees every fiscal to support business expansion plans and improve customer service, chairman CS Setty said. business line in an interaction. The bank also plans to fill “white spaces” by opening 200 to 300 branches this fiscal, he said.

The steps for hiring employees and expanding its physical network are in line with the lender’s plan to double its business size to ₹200 lakh crore in 6-7 years from ₹100 lakh crore in Q2FY26.

“For our network expansion, we are always looking for white spaces. You will be surprised that despite our large network, we may still not have a presence in an emerging colony or township. We don’t want to miss this opportunity and will continue to add branches. Similarly, with ATMs, we have a very strong analytical model. We see where the footfall is growing above a certain number and add ATMs accordingly,” said Setty.

“Today we have a very clear view of the micro markets, where we need to set up a branch and an ATM. We will add 200 to 300 branches in the current fiscal. Our recruitment process is almost complete. In the current fiscal, around 16,000 new employees will join the bank. We are adding this number of people almost every year,” he added.

As of March 2025, SBI’s workforce stood at 2.36 lakh employees in the positions of officers, associates and subordinate staff. Female employees represented approximately 28 percent of the total workforce. SBI’s employee costs rose 11 per cent year-on-year (yoy) to ₹36,837 crore in H1FY26.

Outsourcing subsidiary

Furthermore, the bank plans to deploy its wholly owned subsidiary State Bank Operations Support Services (SBOSS) in rural and semi-urban areas. The bank uses it to help beneficiaries of government schemes, involving their applications in the agricultural sector and small businesses, and uses this supporting subsidiary to monitor more than 60,000 ATMs.

SBI calls OSS employees who monitor the ATMs ‘ATM mitras’.

“These will be local residents who will monitor the availability, maintenance and cleanliness of ATMs, among other things. The RBI has allowed more than 20 activities that can be outsourced to these employees. We will deploy 6,000 people across different branches for floor coordination,” Setty said.

Published on December 9, 2025