MUMBAI: The Business Today Best Bank Awards that are instituted in association with Antiquity, were presented in Mumbai last week. India’s Most Efficient Bank or the Best Bank was awarded to HDFC Bank. To win this award, the bank must not only be an aggressive seeker of growth, but also keep its costs low and profits high.

The other winners in different categories were:

India’s Biggest Bank: State Bank of India (SBI). The main parameters being the size of deposits and average working funds.

India’s Most Productive Bank: Citibank N.A. The bank that generates the most income and business per employee and branch.

India’s Safest Bank: HSBC. The two broad parameters being capital adequacy ratio and loan loss cover.

The chief guest for the evening was Honorable Minister for Commerce and Industry Kamal Nath, who gave away the awards.

The winners have been put through a rigorous KPMG methodology to make the final cut. The evening also saw the release of Business Today’s special issue on India’s Best Banks, by Nath and The India Today Group editor-in-chief Aroon Purie.

Business Today editor Sanjoy Narayan said, "The awards are based on the rigorous survey of Best banks that we do every year. We hope the survey, which covered 86 banks this year and ranked them in order of efficiency, will spur more competition among banks."