RBI penalises Bank of Bahrain & Kuwait, 20 co-operative banks , including 17 from Gujarat for contravention of various norms

Mumbai: The Reserve Bank on Monday said it has imposed a penalty of Rs 2.66 crore on Bank of Bahrain & Kuwait BSC, India operations for non-compliance with directions on cyber security framework.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) also imposed penalty on 20 co-operative banks, including 17 from Gujarat for contravention of various norms.

In a statement, RBI said the Bank of Bahrain & Kuwait BSC, India operations failed to implement systems to detect unusual and unauthorised, internal or external activities in its database.

It also failed to implement security operations centre for obtaining real-time/ near-real time information and insight into the security posture of the bank, and enable audit logs for database and operating system of servers, among others, as per the statement.

A notice was issued to the bank asking it to show cause as to why penalty should not be imposed on it for its failure to comply with the directions issued by RBI.

"After considering the bank's reply to the notice, oral submissions made during personal hearing and additional submissions made by it, RBI came to the conclusion that the charge of non-compliance with the aforesaid RBI direction was substantiated and warranted imposition of monetary penalty, to the extent of non-compliance with such directions," it said.

Besides the co-operative banks of Gujarat, a penalty of Rs 50 lakh has been imposed on Bassein Catholic Co-operative Bank, Vasai ( Maharashtra); Rs 30.85 lakh on The Delhi State Cooperative Bank, New Delhi; and Rs 26,91,330 on The Andhra Pradesh State Co-operative Bank, Vijayawada.

The penalty on 17 co-operative banks range between Rs 50,000 and Rs 7 lakh.

In each case, RBI said the penalties are based on deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the banks with their customers.