DBS Bank India, the wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore-headquartered DBS, reported 15 per cent growth in loans and 11 per cent growth in deposits in 2025-26 (FY26) and received ₹1,600 crore in capital from its parent. Rajat Verma, managing director and chief executive officer (CEO), DBS Bank India, says the bank is keen to invest in and grow its retail lending business but will be judicious in its choice of retail products.
In an interview with Anjali Kumari and Manojit Saha in Mumbai, he spoke about the bank’s growth plans, retail lending, small and medium enterprise (SME) banking, wealth management, and branch strategy. Edited excerpts:
You took charge as India CEO nearly one and a half years ago. Where do you see the bank in the next three to five years?
DBS has been invested in the country for a very long time. We completed 30 years a year ago, so we are now 31 years old in the country. We are incorporated here. We have a very strong corporate bank, institutional business and markets business, and we also have a very distributed retail presence. We have close to 490 branches spread across the country. Of course, some are more concentrated in South India, but they are spread across the country.
We have ambitions on many fronts in the country. We see this as a growth opportunity. Strategically, India has a very robust financial services industry. That gives you the opportunity to scale. We are very positive on many counts. We are very positive on the SME business.
We see quite a broad spectrum of activities. There is wealth management, where we have started to invest more in terms of our teams and capabilities. We have a very strong wealth franchise in Asia. DBS is a very strong name to reckon with in Asia as a wealth management institution. We think it is a natural progression for us here as well, to use some of the capabilities and understanding of that business.
How do you see the opportunity in retail lending?
We also see an opportunity in retail lending through our franchise, which is a very different business. Our format is a broad universal banking format, which means we do corporate banking, global financial markets, and treasury as a large mid-sized bank. We also do retail lending, retail current account savings account (Casa), and branch banking. So, it is a fairly universal bank.
That said, we would not be all things to all people. We cannot do all products because that thins us out and does not give us scale. We will have to be judicious in our choice of products.
We are judicious in our choice of retail products that we offer, as our objective is to have sufficient density and be able to reach scale in whatever we offer so that we can improve efficiencies.
We are very keen to invest more to grow our retail lending business. There are a few standout products, such as loans against property and gold loans, that form the bulk of our retail lending.
In gold loans, the potential is massive. These retail lending products have great social value by enabling financial inclusion and can spur entrepreneurship at the ground level. If you focus on providing a good, frictionless process and customer experience, then you could add a lot of value to this market.
How has the business grown in recent years?
On March 31, we grew our assets and liabilities over the previous period. Net advances recorded strong growth of 15 per cent to ₹62,172 crore. Deposits registered year-on-year (Y-o-Y) growth of 11 per cent to ₹92,117 crore, supported by strong Casa momentum. Casa grew by 15.1 per cent Y-o-Y in FY26.
We’ve seen strong Casa momentum over the last year. Our savings account interest rate is very competitive at 5 per cent for savings account balances above ₹2 lakh and up to ₹50 lakh.
Profit after tax increased by 49 per cent in FY26 to ₹1,020 crore, reflecting an improvement in overall profitability.
There was an equity infusion of ₹1,600 crore in March this year, which improved the capital adequacy ratio to 19.7 per cent and is expected to further support balance-sheet growth.
How has the asset quality of the bank been?
Our gross non-performing asset (NPA) ratio declined to 1.34 per cent in FY26 from 2.78 per cent in 2024-25 (FY25), and net NPA declined to 0.23 per cent in FY26 from 0.28 per cent in FY25.
Management of risk at an early stage and looking at the early indicators of stress are important. I believe that we understand risk management well and are managing it well, which will stand us in good stead in the long term. The credit environment has also improved.
NPAs at the market level have reduced, governance around risk has improved, and hence there is a self-correction mechanism with strong checks and balances, creating a system that we all benefit from.
What is the mix of the loan book?
There is retail, SME and then corporate — large corporate and mid-corporate. By and large, if you look historically, it is split fairly equally between retail and SME. They are similar to each other, while wholesale is larger. It varies over time.
We have more than doubled our SME asset book over the past three years, from 2022-23 to FY26, with consistent compounding. Our ambitions are broader and bigger, but it’s a very good start. I am very encouraged by the growth in our SME business and our lending to both micro as well as small and medium businesses. It’s a good-quality book and we are able to cross-sell to these customers and grow with them. Hence, we see a long-term opportunity where we can cater to their needs as a universal bank.
We have a thriving corporate banking franchise, with relationships with large companies, and over time we have started working with mid-sized companies as well, extending our offering across the entire corporate spectrum. We are committed to deepening our relationships with large and midcap Indian companies, some of which may want to expand overseas.
DBS can also be a conduit for multinationals, whether Asian or Western, expanding into India. DBS is a logical choice for institutions that deal across borders or have branches overseas, as they can leverage our international network. Within that, you have the custodial business, which is niche but important for the country and for banks.
Which will be your engine of growth for DBS in the next five years? Is it retail or corporate?
All. As I mentioned to you, we have a universal bank model. We will have focuses on the wholesale bank, the retail bank and SME for sure.
The ratios could be determined by credit cycles, cost of funding, competition and all of these things. The SME growth rate in the past, has been the highest among the three subsectors.
In retail, we are committed to using our retail network for lending. At this point in time, gold loans are an important product for us. We have invested in that and we understand the product. Loans against property are an important product for us and we are investing more and more into that.
On the corporate side and SME side, it is largely SME financing companies and most of it is backed by working capital, which is the typical model that you have.
On wealth management, what is the client profile you are targeting?
Wealth is, firstly, a long-term story for India. We feel we have a proposition which is strong, a good set of people and a good team, which we are expanding. We are expanding our team and hiring people in wealth management.
We are investing in the centres. It is a statement of intent that we want to make. We are a very strong force in wealth management in Asia. Therefore, more investment in India is something we think is logical.
In wealth, we are looking at people with ₹30-40 lakh and above, which we call Treasures. That is our traditional proposition. We also recently launched another product called Aspire, where the cutoff is ₹10 lakh.
Across Asia, DBS will launch 18 new wealth centres by 2027 and upgrade 36 of its existing wealth centres over the next 18 months. This includes the opening of eight new DBS Treasures Centres and upgrading at least 30 existing branches in India over the next 18-24 months.
How has been the mobilisation under the RBI’s FCNR (B) deposit scheme?
The FCNR (B) deposit swap facility announced by RBI was very well timed and positive for the country. We are supportive of the scheme, the calibrated communication around it and we have been dedicating efforts towards making the most of it. We are tracking well against our internal plan to leverage the FCNR (B) scheme, and I am satisfied with our progress.
How has the use of AI improved efficiency?
The AI and GenAI use cases we have piloted, always with a human in the loop, have helped reduce manual effort, deepen customer engagement and free up employees to focus on higher-value tasks. As we continue to evangelise these technologies across the organisation, we are combining robust governance and clear guardrails with employee upskilling to drive responsible adoption. More than two-thirds of DBS Bank India employees actively use GenAI tools as part of their day-to-day work.
DBS Bank India has deployed a GenAI-enabled content-capture solution for transaction processing across corporate and retail banking operations. By removing routine administrative tasks from day-to-day operations, the tool allows employees to focus on activities that require analysis, judgement and customer support.
In July 2026, DBS Group announced the next evolution of its AI-enabled virtual assistants, DBS Joy for corporate customers and DBS digibot for individual customers, bringing Generative AI and agentic AI capabilities to more than 10 million users across Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
As featured in Business Standard
World’s Best Bank 2025, 2021, 2019, Euromoney
World’s Best Bank for Customer Experience 2025, Euromoney
World’s Best Bank for Corporate Responsibility 2025, 2023, Euromoney
Asia’s Safest Bank, 2009 – 2025, Global Finance
Best Bank in the World 2022, Global Finance
India’s Best International Bank 2021, Asiamoney
World’s Best Banks - #1 in India 2021, Forbes
World’s Safest Commercial Bank 2021, Global Finance
