New Delhi: Oriental Bank of Commerce today (Jul 26, 2004) announced it would take over the troubled Global Trust Bank (GTB) facing severe financial problems that had prompted the RBI to impose a three-month moratorium.

"The scheme (of merging the GTB with OBC) has been approved by the RBI," Oriental Bank of Commerce chairman B D Narang said.

"We are in touch with the RBI and moving fast on the matter (merger)," Narang said.

He assured that the stakeholders' interests would be looked after.

The move by OBC comes in the wake of the RBI imposing a moratorium in order to prevent a run on the GTB after the banking regulator found some "irregularities" in the bank, whose net non-performing assets stood as high as 19 per cent of the net advances.

The moratorium would be inclusive of October 23, 2004 or an earlier date, until an alternate arrangement is made, the apex bank had said.

During this period, the RBI had said it would consider various options, including amalgamation of GTB with any other bank and finalisation of plans in public interest.

The depositors would be permitted to withdraw upto Rs 10,000 from their savings bank or current accounts or any other deposit account through any of the branches of the bank, the central bank had said.