"A team of 15-20 members has been set up and it has started working on the framework for the merger. SBI alone has close to 16,500 branches, including 198 foreign offices spread across 36 countries.SBI first merged State Bank of Saurashtra with itself in 2008. "We are looking at SBI (proposal) at the moment. "The idea is to merge all the five associate banks at the same time. "Immediately after the announcement, the associate banks' employee union had termed the board's decision as arrogant and had gone on a nation-wide strike on May 20.

Source: Economic Times June 12, 2016 09:11 UTC