Wednesday, November 23 2005 19:25 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Kochi: Private sector Lord Krishna Bank is presently not harbouring any merger plans and will instead focus on its IPO launch during 2006-07 fiscal, Bank Director, Mohan Puri said.

"We are not talking with anybody. We are rather concentrating on our March balance sheet," Puri, who holds approximately about 60 per cent stake in the LKB, told a press meet here last night (Nov 22, 2003), scotching reports about possible merger plans with some private banks.

"The LKB would not be forced to merge with any bank. Only if it (merger) makes sense, we will merge."

"Keeping in mind the RBI guidelines on the ownership of private banks, their governance and the urgent need for consolidation, and the approach of the Federal Bank for a possible merger, LKB had agreed to consider the matter favourably subject to due diligence by LKB on Federal bank and vice versa," he said.

The proposal to merge was in principle considered by Federal Bank and LKB and the merger would have created a third largest private sector bank in the country.

"The due diligence was satisfactorily carried out after the in-principle approval of the board of directors of both banks. However, the merger could not take place because of lack of agreement on valuations concerning the shares of the two banks and other terms," he said, ruling out sabotage from any quarters.

"The protection of the 1200 LKB staff was among our top agenda," he said.

"Of all the plans, Federal bank was the best candidate and the merger would have made a perfect business sense," he said.