RBI rejects candidates proposed by TMB for the MD & CEO position; posts an Additional Director

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has rejected three candidates proposed by Tamilnad Mercantile Bank (TMB) for the post of Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. Further, the central bank has appointed its Thiruvananthapurambased Regional Director Thomas Mathew as an Additional Director on the board of TMB.

The RBI said the candidates proposed by the Thoothukudiheadquartered TMB were not found suitable, per the private sector bank’s regulatory filing.

The bank was asked to submit a fresh panel of candidates with suitable experience.

The TMB board, at its meeting held on November 22, 2023, had finalised the names of three candidates for the position of MD & CEO.

S Krishnan, who took charge of the bank on September 4, 2022, resigned as MD & CEO on September 28, 2023, citing personal reasons. However, he continues to helm the bank with a successor not in sight.

The resignation came in the backdrop of a technical glitch, which led to a wrong credit of ₹9,000 crore into a taxi driver’s account in September 2023.

“The mistake was noticed immediately and the entries were reversed. We have now introduced additional checks for authorising the NACH credit transactions. There is no financial loss to the bank in this regard,” per TMB’s September 2023 regulatory filing.

In an analyst call in October 2023, Krishnan clarified: “What happened has nothing to do with the cyber security. It was a technical glitch because of which this wrong credit has come... we have done a root cause analysis as to what and how it went wrong. And we have plugged all those things, put in place a system that it doesn’t recur any more.

Thomas Mathew’s appointment as an Additional Director of TMB is for two years from April 12, or till further orders, whichever is earlier, in the place of S B Suresh Kumar, RBI General Manager, who has since retired.