Sources said the ministry asked PSBs to expedite the process of filling pending vacancies.
The ministry had reviewed the vacancies in earlier this month and advised them to take action to fill them.
Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had directed him to fill the backlog vacancies of Scheduled Caste SCs in a time-bound manner.
The total employees strength peaked at 8.86 lakh during 2012 -- 13 It declined to 7.80 lakh during 2020 -- 21.
Advertisements for recruitment have started being issued. The country's biggest lender State Bank of India SBI has issued advertisements for the recruitment of 1,673 probationary officers. 1,600 are regular vacancies, while 73 are backlog cases.
Due to COVID 19 the recruitment process got impacted and there are some backlogs that will be filled in due course of time, a senior PSB official said.
Central Bank of India has issued advertisements seeking applications for filling 110 specialist officers vacancies.
At the same time, the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection IBPS has started the process of recruitment of about 6,500 probationary officers management trainees through a common exam for the various state-owned banks, including Bank of Baroda, Bank of Maharashtra, Bank of Maharashtra, Canara Bank, Central Bank of India, Indian Bank, Indian Overs Bank, Punjab National Bank, Punjab Sind Bank, UCO Bank and Union Bank of India.
Most of the recruitment is done by IBPS while specialist officers' recruitment is conducted by individual banks.
Financial institutions like Small Industries Development of India Sidbi have also invited applications for the positions of programme executives and programme leads.
There were 4,334 new branches opened in 2020. It came to 3,064 in 2021, as per the Report on Trend and Progress of Banking in India 2020 -- 21'', according to the Report on Trend and Progress of Banking in India 2020 -- 21''.