What Bank PO panels ask, in one paragraph
A Bank PO interview board asks about eight things, in roughly this order: who you are (name, town, family, what you have done since graduating), why banking and why this post, your academic subject and project, banking concepts and the RBI, a branch situation to test your judgement, something from this week's news, the odd part of your profile (an engineer, a gap year, a job left), and the economy of your district. Below are 64 questions across those eight groups, each with the follow-up a board usually adds, a model answer of about 90 to 150 words written by TalkDrill, and a line on what the panel is listening for. Per the SBI PO 2026-27 advertisement (CRPD/PO/2026-27/09), the SBI interview carries 30 marks alongside a 20-mark Group Exercise; per the IBPS CRP PO/MT-XVI notification, the IBPS PO interview carries 100 marks with a qualifying floor of 40% (35% for SC, ST, OBC and PwBD candidates) and counts 20% of the final score. The same questions appear in both. SBI interviews run from 18 November 2026 per the SBI notice; IBPS interviews run in November and December 2026 per the IBPS notification.
- Read one group a day, not the whole page. Eight groups, eight days.
- For each question, read the model answer once, close the page, and say your own version aloud. Record it on your phone or in an AI mock interview and listen back.
- Every answer here is a TalkDrill worked example, not a real candidate's account. The names and towns are illustrative. Yours must be true.
- No current RBI rate is printed. Each banking answer says where to read the live figure.
How the interview is marked: SBI and IBPS
The two recruiters weigh the interview differently, and the difference should change how you prepare. SBI splits Phase III into a Group Exercise and a Personal Interview and then normalises the whole phase to a quarter of the final score; IBPS has a single interview worth a fifth of the final score with a published qualifying floor. Both put a personality report in front of the panel before you walk in.
| Item | SBI PO 2026-27 | IBPS PO (CRP PO/MT-XVI) |
|---|---|---|
| Source | Advertisement CRPD/PO/2026-27/09 and the Phase III notice (October 2026) | CRP PO/MT-XVI detailed notification, section J |
| Before the interview | Psychometric test, 31 October 2026 per the notice; "findings of the test will be placed before the Interview panel"; all questions mandatory | Personality Test (self-report), November 2026; "non-qualifying in nature" but mandatory to be eligible for the interview |
| Spoken rounds | Group Exercise 20 marks + Interview 30 marks = 50 | Interview, 100 marks |
| Qualifying marks | "As decided by the Bank" | Not less than 40%; 35% for SC, ST, OBC and PwBD |
| Weight in the final score | Main (230) and Phase III (50) normalised to 75 and 25 out of 100 | Main examination and interview in the ratio 80:20 |
| Dates | GE and interviews from 18 November 2026 onwards; call letters "shortly" per the notice | Interviews November and December 2026; call letters from ibps.in |
| Who conducts it | SBI | Participating banks, coordinated by a nodal bank in each state or region with IBPS |
Two practical consequences. First, the SBI candidate spends real time on the Group Exercise, because 20 of the 50 spoken marks are decided in a room with other candidates. Second, the IBPS candidate cannot treat the interview as a formality: a score under the 40% floor removes a candidate from the merit list regardless of the Main score, and the notification says the interview score of such candidates "shall not be disclosed". The worked arithmetic for both is on the marks and weightage page.
How to prepare answers in your own words
The model answers below are written to be read once and then abandoned. What you keep is the shape. Four habits turn a borrowed answer into your own in about ten minutes per question.
1. The four-line frame
Almost every good interview answer has the same skeleton. Claim: one sentence that answers the question directly. Example: one real thing from your life that proves it (a shop, a project, a loan, a week in a village). Link: one sentence that connects it to a branch, a customer or a rule. Stop: finish on a full stop, not on "and so on". Open any model answer here and you will see the four lines. Write your own four lines in a notebook before you try to speak the answer; speaking from four lines sounds natural, speaking from a paragraph sounds recited.
2. The one-true-thing rule
Each answer needs one fact a board could check or probe: the name of your district's lead bank, the product your father's shop sells, the module of your final-year project, the title of the last book you finished. Panels believe the specific. "I like reading" earns nothing; "the last book I finished was a history of the 1991 reforms and the idea that stayed with me was how close the country came to default" earns a follow-up you can answer. If you cannot name one true thing, you do not yet have an answer, only an opinion.
3. Prepare the follow-up, not just the question
Every item below carries a likely follow-up because the follow-up is where marks move. Boards ask the first question from their list and the second from your answer. For each of your four-line answers, write the hardest question a sceptical uncle would ask about it, and prepare that too. If your follow-up answer is "I don't know, I would check the RBI circular", say exactly that, briefly; boards mark a clean admission far higher than a confident guess.
4. Record, listen, cut
Speak each answer aloud and time it. Introductions should land around ninety seconds; most other answers between forty-five and ninety. Listen back once for content (did the claim come first?) and once for delivery (fillers, a trailing "so yeah", sentences that never end). Cut, then record again. Two recordings per question across the eight groups is about eight hours of work spread over three weeks, which is the plan on the three-week plan page.
For Hindi-medium candidates
Prepare the four lines in whichever language they come to you in, then say the claim line in English even if the rest is in Hindi. The first sentence is what the panel remembers, and an English claim followed by a Hindi example is a pattern boards hear every day and do not penalise. The third transcript on the mock interviews page shows it in full. Build your English claim lines with the mistakes Hindi speakers make page open beside you.
Introduction questions (q01 to q06)
The first five minutes decide the tone of the rest. Panels open with your name, your town, your family and your time since graduation because those answers are easy to check against your form and hard to fake. Keep each one to about ninety seconds, give one concrete fact per sentence, and finish on something that leads towards banking so the next question comes from your own words rather than the panel's list. Every answer below is a TalkDrill worked example. Replace the towns, degrees and shops with yours.
Q01. Tell me about yourself
Panel: Tell me about yourself.
Likely follow-up: You have told us your degree and your hobbies. What have you actually done in the last twelve months?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Good morning, sir, good morning, ma'am. I am Priya Verma from Gorakhpur in eastern Uttar Pradesh. I completed my B.Com from DDU Gorakhpur University in 2024 with accounting and taxation as my main papers. Since then I have done two things. I helped my father run his fertiliser shop, where I handled the daily cash book and the GST filing through a local accountant, and I prepared for banking exams. Working in the shop taught me how small traders think about credit and how often they are unbanked for the wrong reasons. I like reading the RBI's monthly bulletin summaries and I play badminton at the district club. I want to join as a Probationary Officer because it is the one job where my accounting training and my comfort with ordinary customers are both useful on day one.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for structure, for one concrete activity since graduation, and for a reason to join banking that comes from your own life rather than a coaching script. Ninety seconds is enough.
Q02. Tell us about your hometown or district
Panel: Tell us something about your hometown.
Likely follow-up: What is the main occupation there, and how do banks matter to it?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I am from Nalanda district in Bihar, about an hour and a half from Patna. Most families around us depend on farming, mainly paddy and wheat, with vegetables in the smaller plots, and many households have one member working in Delhi, Punjab or the Gulf who sends money home. That mix matters for a bank. Remittances arrive through accounts, so even small villages now have account holders, but credit still comes mostly from local lenders because paperwork feels difficult. Nalanda is also known for the ruins of the ancient university and for the Rajgir hot springs, so there is seasonal tourism around guest houses and transport. If I were posted in a branch like Bihar Sharif, I would spend time on Kisan Credit Cards and on moving the small transport operators from informal credit to a formal loan with a proper repayment schedule.
What the panel is listening for: Panels use this question to check whether you observe your own surroundings. They mark the link you make between the place and banking, not the tourist facts.
Q03. Strengths and weaknesses
Panel: What are your strengths and weaknesses?
Likely follow-up: Give us one example where that weakness cost you something.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
My main strength is that I finish what I start. In my final year I was the only one in a group of four who kept the project schedule, and we submitted two weeks before the deadline. I am also comfortable with numbers and with people at the same time, which I learnt from handling customers at my uncle's hardware shop. My weakness is that I take too long to say no. Last year I agreed to coach two juniors for their exams in the same month as my own mains, and my own revision suffered. I have started keeping a written weekly plan and checking any new request against it before I agree. It is not fully fixed, but I now decline faster, and I say why.
What the panel is listening for: A real weakness with a real cost and a visible correction scores. "I am a perfectionist" and "I work too hard" are marked as evasion by most boards.
Q04. Hobbies and interests
Panel: What are your hobbies?
Likely follow-up: You said reading. Name the last book you finished and one idea from it.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I have two regular hobbies. The first is long-distance cycling. I ride about forty kilometres every Sunday with a small group in Nagpur, and it has taught me more about pacing than any lecture, because if you start too fast you do not finish. The second is reading non-fiction, mostly about the Indian economy. The last book I finished was a history of the 1991 reforms, and the idea that stayed with me was how close the country came to defaulting before the gold was pledged. It made me take banking seriously as a public service rather than a job. I also help run my colony's WhatsApp group for civic complaints, which is less a hobby than a habit, but it has made me patient with people who are angry for good reasons.
What the panel is listening for: Boards ask a follow-up on whichever hobby you name. Name only what you can discuss for three minutes without preparation.
Q05. Family background
Panel: Tell us about your family.
Likely follow-up: Your father is a government employee. Why did you not follow him into the same department?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
We are a family of five in Cuttack. My father retired last year as a clerk in the Odisha state electricity office, my mother manages the home and runs a small tailoring unit with two women from the neighbourhood, my elder sister is a staff nurse in Bhubaneswar, and my younger brother is in class twelve. My father's work taught me what a steady government salary does for a family: both my sister and I could study without a loan. My mother's tailoring unit taught me the opposite side, how hard it is for a small business to get even a small working-capital loan without a guarantor. Between the two, I decided I wanted a career where I was the person on the other side of that counter, with the authority to say yes to someone like her.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is not grading your family. They are checking whether you can speak about ordinary facts with warmth and without rambling, and whether you connect your background to the job.
Q06. What have you done since graduating?
Panel: You graduated in 2024. What have you been doing since then?
Likely follow-up: So you have been preparing for exams for two years. Is that not a waste of a degree?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I graduated in June 2024 and I have done three things since. For the first eight months I worked as a trainee at a chartered accountant's office in Jaipur, mostly on tally entries and GST reconciliation for small clients, which paid a small stipend and taught me how real businesses keep accounts. I left in early 2025 to prepare full-time for banking exams, and I cleared IBPS PO prelims last year but missed the mains cut-off by a small margin. Since then I have kept a strict routine: four hours of study, one hour of newspaper reading with notes, and an hour teaching accountancy to two class-twelve students, which keeps my concepts sharp and pays for my books. I would not call the time wasted. The CA office taught me the customer's side of banking, and the preparation taught me discipline I did not have at twenty-one.
What the panel is listening for: Gaps are normal; the panel wants an honest account with at least one productive activity and no defensiveness. Mentioning a near miss calmly reads as maturity.
Why banking, why PO, why this bank (q07 to q14)
This is the group where coaching-centre answers are easiest to spot. "Job security" and "service to society" are true for everyone in the room, so they earn nothing. The panel wants a reason that could only be yours: a shop, a loan your family took, a job you left, a number you noticed. The follow-ups in this group are the sharpest in the whole interview ("will you leave for an SO post?", "will you take a smaller bank?") and the honest answer, said calmly, is always safer than the heroic one.
Q07. Why do you want to join banking?
Panel: Why do you want to join the banking sector?
Likely follow-up: Everyone says "job security and service to society". Give us a reason that is yours.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I will give you the reason that is mine rather than the standard one. In 2022 my mother's self-help group in Bhagalpur got its first bank linkage loan. The officer who processed it spent two visits explaining the repayment schedule in Angika because half the group could not read the Hindi form. That loan bought three sewing machines and the group has repaid every instalment. I saw one officer with the authority to approve a small loan change twelve households. That is what a public-sector bank PO can do, and no private job I looked at offers that mix of authority and reach so early. I also like the career path: structured promotions, rotation across credit, operations and foreign exchange, and the chance to work in both a village branch and a city office. The salary and stability matter too, but they are the floor, not the reason.
What the panel is listening for: The weakest answers list sector benefits. The strongest tie banking to something the candidate saw or did. The panel also checks that you understand a PO does credit and operations, not only counter work.
Q08. Why PO and not clerk, SO or RBI?
Panel: Why Probationary Officer? Why not a Specialist Officer post or a clerical post?
Likely follow-up: If you are offered a Specialist Officer IT post tomorrow, will you leave?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I chose the PO route deliberately. A clerical post is a good job, but the officer cadre is where credit decisions, branch targets and team responsibility sit, and I want that responsibility early. A Specialist Officer role would use my B.Tech directly, but it would keep me in one function, usually IT or risk, for most of my career. The PO path rotates me through the whole bank: deposits, retail credit, agricultural lending, then possibly treasury or international banking, and promotions are open to the top. As for RBI, I respect it and may attempt Grade B later, but RBI is a regulator; I want to work with customers first and understand lending from the branch upward. If I am offered an SO post after I join, I would not leave. I would rather earn a specialisation inside the bank than start again outside.
What the panel is listening for: The panel checks whether you understand what a PO actually does and whether you are a flight risk. A clear preference with reasons, plus a direct answer to the "will you leave" probe, scores well.
Q09. Why SBI, or why this bank?
Panel: Why do you want to join SBI in particular?
Likely follow-up: If IBPS allots you a smaller public-sector bank instead, will you take it?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Three reasons, in order. First, reach: SBI has branches in places where it is the only bank, so an SBI officer is part of the public infrastructure of that place, and I want that kind of work. Second, the range of roles: the bank has retail, corporate, agricultural, international and treasury verticals, and an officer who performs well can move across them rather than being boxed into one. Third, training: the bank's own institutes and the structured probation period mean I would be taught the job properly before being judged on it. I do not want to run down other banks; every public-sector bank does the same core work. If IBPS allots me a different bank, I will join on the first day and do the same job with the same seriousness, because the customer in front of me will not care which logo is on the building.
What the panel is listening for: Avoid reciting the bank's founding date and tagline; the panel knows them. They want reasons tied to the work and an honest answer about allotment. Facts you quote about the bank should come from its own website.
Q10. What does a Probationary Officer do?
Panel: What do you think a Probationary Officer does during the day?
Likely follow-up: And after probation, when you are a branch officer, what changes?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
From the bank's careers pages and from talking to two serving officers, a PO's first year is a rotation. You sit at the counter and learn account opening, KYC and cash, you shadow the credit officer on loan files, you visit customers with the field officer, and you spend blocks of time at the training institute. The point is to learn every desk before you own one. After probation, the work becomes supervision and decision: approving transactions above the clerical limit, processing retail and small-business loans within your delegated authority, handling complaints the counter cannot close, meeting deposit and lending targets, and signing off the branch's end-of-day. In a small branch you may be the second officer and effectively run operations when the manager is out. It is a job of many small decisions, each with a rule behind it, and I like that kind of work.
What the panel is listening for: Candidates who think a PO is a desk clerk with a better salary are marked down. The panel wants to hear "credit", "delegated authority", "customer", and a sense that rural posting and targets are normal.
Q11. Are you willing to work in a rural branch?
Panel: Your first posting may be a rural branch far from home. Are you comfortable with that?
Likely follow-up: You live in Hyderabad. Have you ever lived in a village for more than a week?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Yes, and I have thought about it rather than just saying yes. I grew up in Hyderabad, but my grandparents' house is in a village in Nalgonda district, and I spent every summer there until college, so I know what it is like to live where the nearest ATM is ten kilometres away and the power goes at four. A rural posting is also where a young officer learns the most. The branch is small, so you do everything: KCC renewals, pension accounts, Jan Dhan accounts, recovery visits. You learn the customer's language and the local economy in a way a metro branch never teaches. I will not pretend it has no cost; I will be far from family for a few years. But the transfer policy is known in advance, and I would rather do the hard posting at twenty-four than at forty with children in school.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is testing for a prepared yes, not a reflex. Evidence of past rural exposure and a realistic view of the cost both help. Over-enthusiasm without detail is noted.
Q12. Where do you see yourself in five years?
Panel: Where do you see yourself five years from now?
Likely follow-up: Promotions in public-sector banks are slow. What if you are still a Scale I officer at that point?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
In five years I would like to have finished my probation, completed a full rural posting, and be working as a credit officer in a mid-size branch, with the JAIIB and CAIIB certifications done, because those are the examinations the industry itself uses to mark a banker who has learnt the trade. If the first promotion comes in that window, good; if it does not, the credit desk still gives me the experience that the next promotion depends on. I am also interested in agricultural finance and MSME lending, so I would try to get into the bank's training programme on those. Outside work, I want to be the person in my family who finally understands insurance and tax well enough to advise my parents. That is a modest plan, but it is one I can execute from the first day.
What the panel is listening for: Specific, bank-internal milestones (JAIIB, CAIIB, a credit posting) tell the panel you have read about the career. Vague ambition or a plan to leave for an MBA is marked down.
Q13. Why a public-sector bank and not a private one?
Panel: Private banks pay more at entry. Why a public-sector bank?
Likely follow-up: Is that not just a preference for a comfortable job?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I applied to both, so this is a considered choice. Private banks pay more at entry, and some pay a lot more, but the entry role is usually sales with a monthly target, and the first years are about acquiring accounts rather than learning credit. A public-sector PO rotates through operations, credit and recovery, is given delegated authority early, and works with the customers that private banks often do not serve: small farmers, pensioners, the self-help group, the first-generation account holder. I find that work more interesting, not only more secure. There is also the matter of priority sector lending and government schemes, which run largely through public-sector branches; being part of that is part of the appeal. I do not think of it as comfortable. Recovery visits and rural postings are not comfortable. It is a different kind of difficulty, and it is the kind I want.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants to hear that you know what private-bank entry roles involve, and that your choice is about the work and not only about security. Avoid criticising private banks; several panel members have worked in them.
Q14. Why not an MBA or a higher degree?
Panel: With your profile you could do an MBA. Why not?
Likely follow-up: Will you leave the bank to do one later?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I did consider it. An MBA from a good institute means a fee I would spend years repaying, and at the end most graduates enter the same two industries, banking and consulting. Joining as a PO lets me enter banking two years earlier, without debt, and learn it from the inside. The bank also has its own route to further study: officers can do a part-time management programme or the CAIIB while working, and some banks sponsor advanced courses. If I feel the need for a formal management degree later, I would prefer to do it while in service, through the options the bank itself allows, rather than resign. My honest view is that the first five years of credit and branch work will teach me more that is useful to a banker than a classroom would, and the degree can follow when it has something to build on.
What the panel is listening for: The flight-risk probe again. A candidate who knows about in-service study options and gives a clear "I would not resign" reads as stable.
Academics: your subject, your project, your marks (q15 to q20)
You will be asked about what you studied, and the board will push until it reaches something you actually understand. The test is not whether you remember the syllabus; it is whether you can explain one idea from it to a layperson, and whether you can connect it to a loan, a deposit or a customer. Low marks and abandoned subjects are asked about directly. Give the cause in one sentence and the correction in two; never argue with the marksheet.
Q15. Your favourite subject and its use in banking
Panel: Which subject did you like most in your degree, and how is it useful in a bank?
Likely follow-up: Explain one concept from that subject as you would to a customer.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
My favourite paper was Financial Management in the second year of B.Com, especially the topics on working capital and the time value of money. It is directly useful in a branch. When a small trader asks for a cash-credit limit, the officer is really asking how much working capital the business needs, which is the gap between what it must pay suppliers and when customers pay it. The time value of money is behind every EMI and every fixed-deposit rate. If a customer asks me why a five-year deposit pays a different rate from a one-year deposit, I can explain it in plain words: the bank is paying for the certainty of holding your money longer. I also liked Statistics, which helps in reading the bank's own MIS reports. The subject I liked least, honestly, was Business Law, but I now see why a banker needs it.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants an academic concept turned into branch language. Candidates who can only name the subject are pushed with the follow-up, so prepare one worked explanation.
Q16. Your final-year project
Panel: Tell us about your final-year project.
Likely follow-up: What was the hardest technical problem in it, and how did you solve it?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
My final-year project was a web application for a college canteen that let students pre-order and pay through UPI, with a simple queue display at the counter. I worked in a team of three; my part was the payment flow and the order database. The hardest problem was handling a payment that succeeded on the UPI side but failed to reach our server, so the student was charged and no order was created. We solved it by storing every payment intent before redirecting to the app, then reconciling against the gateway's status API every two minutes and auto-creating or refunding. That taught me something that applies in banking: the transaction record is the truth, and reconciliation is not an afterthought. The canteen used the system for one semester. It was not sophisticated, but it worked, and it handled real money, which forced us to be careful.
What the panel is listening for: The panel checks whether you did the work yourself. Expect a technical follow-up at the level of your degree. Linking the project to a banking principle is a bonus, not a substitute.
Q17. Why are your graduation marks low?
Panel: Your marks dropped in the second year of graduation. Why?
Likely follow-up: How do we know this will not happen when work gets difficult?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
That is a fair question and I will not dress it up. In my second year my father was unwell for about four months and I was the one managing his treatment in Varanasi, which meant missing classes and sitting two papers with almost no preparation. My aggregate fell from about seventy per cent in the first year to the high fifties in the second. In the third year I recovered to the first-year level, and that recovery is the part I would ask you to weigh. What I learnt is practical: I now keep a buffer in every schedule, I ask for help earlier, and I do not let a bad month become a bad year. At work, the equivalent would be telling my branch manager early when something at home is affecting my work, rather than letting it show in the numbers first.
What the panel is listening for: An honest reason, the actual figures without hiding them, and proof of recovery. The panel is listening for ownership; blaming the university or the examiners is marked down.
Q18. Why did you not pursue your subject further?
Panel: You did a B.Sc in Chemistry. Why not an M.Sc or research?
Likely follow-up: So is your degree wasted?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I liked Chemistry enough to finish the degree well, but by the third year I knew I did not want a laboratory career. Research needs a kind of patience with slow, uncertain results that I respect but do not have; I am better in roles with people, numbers and clear decisions. The degree is not wasted. Chemistry taught me to be exact about measurement, to keep records that another person can check, and to not trust a result I cannot reproduce. Those are useful habits for someone who will be approving transactions and loan files. It also gave me a basic understanding of industries like fertilisers, pharmaceuticals and textiles, which are exactly the small and mid-size businesses a branch lends to. I would say the degree gave me a way of thinking; banking is where I want to apply it.
What the panel is listening for: A common probe for science and engineering graduates. The panel wants a calm, non-apologetic account, plus two or three transferable skills stated concretely.
Q19. What did you learn outside the syllabus?
Panel: What have you learnt in the last two years that was not part of any syllabus?
Likely follow-up: How did you learn it, and how do you know you learnt it well?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Two things. The first is spreadsheets at a working level, not the college level. I taught myself lookups, pivot tables and basic data cleaning by rebuilding my father's shop accounts from his paper ledger, and I know I learnt it because the GST figures I produced matched the accountant's to the rupee. The second is speaking English in front of strangers. I come from a Hindi-medium school, and two years ago I could read and write English well but froze when speaking. I joined a weekend speaking group, recorded myself answering common interview questions every evening, and asked people to correct me. I still make mistakes, and you will hear some today, but I no longer avoid speaking. I mention both because a PO needs to be comfortable with a spreadsheet and comfortable with a customer who speaks a different language, and I was weak at both two years ago.
What the panel is listening for: Self-directed learning with evidence of outcome scores. Admitting a weakness you are still fixing, in the room, is usually read as confidence rather than weakness.
Q20. Which topic from your degree applies to a loan decision?
Panel: Name one topic from your degree that would help you decide whether to give a loan.
Likely follow-up: And what would you look for that your textbook did not mention?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Ratio analysis from Financial Accounting. When a small business applies for a term loan, the key questions are whether it earns enough to pay the instalments and whether it is already too indebted. The debt-service coverage ratio answers the first: cash available for debt payments divided by the payments due. The debt-equity ratio answers the second. Current ratio tells me whether the business can meet its short-term obligations. The textbook stops there. What it did not mention is that for a small borrower the statements may be informal, so the officer looks at bank statements for actual cash flows, GST returns for actual turnover, and the physical business for stock and footfall. Character also matters: how the applicant has handled earlier small loans, whether suppliers trust them with credit. A ratio tells you if the loan can be repaid; the visit tells you if it will be.
What the panel is listening for: For commerce and management graduates this is almost certain. The panel wants the ratios named correctly and then the practical layer beyond them.
Banking awareness: the concepts panels actually ask (q21 to q36)
Sixteen concepts cover most of what a PO board asks: the policy rates and the corridor, CRR and SLR, NPAs, UPI and the digital rupee, priority sector lending, KYC, the functions of the RBI, payment systems, inclusion, inflation, NBFCs, how a bank earns, and capital adequacy. Each answer explains the idea, says why it reaches a branch, and names where the current figure is published instead of quoting a number. Rates change between the day you read this and the day you sit; the RBI's latest Monetary Policy Statement on rbi.org.in is the only figure worth quoting, and saying so is itself a good answer. The sibling page on banking awareness for the interview goes wider.
Q21. What is the repo rate?
Panel: What is the repo rate, and why does it matter to a bank branch?
Likely follow-up: What is the current repo rate, and when was it last changed?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The repo rate is the rate at which the Reserve Bank lends to commercial banks for short periods against government securities, under a repurchase agreement: the bank sells the securities to the RBI and buys them back at a slightly higher price, and that difference is the interest. It is the main policy rate. When the RBI raises it, borrowing becomes costlier, banks pass the cost on through their lending rates, and credit growth slows, which is meant to control inflation. A cut does the opposite. At the branch it matters because most floating-rate retail loans are linked to an external benchmark, usually the repo rate, so a change by the Monetary Policy Committee changes customers' EMIs within weeks and brings them to the counter. For the current rate, I would refer to the latest Monetary Policy Statement on the RBI website rather than quote from memory.
What the panel is listening for: The panel expects the mechanism, the inflation link and the branch effect. Quoting the latest figure from the RBI press release is good; quoting a stale figure confidently is worse than saying where to check it.
Q22. Reverse repo, SDF and MSF
Panel: What is the difference between the repo rate, the reverse repo rate and the marginal standing facility?
Likely follow-up: What is the Standing Deposit Facility, and why was it introduced?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The repo rate is what banks pay to borrow from the RBI against securities. The reverse repo rate is what the RBI pays banks that park surplus money with it against securities. The Marginal Standing Facility is an emergency window: a bank that has run out of eligible securities can still borrow overnight from the RBI, at a rate above the repo rate, by dipping into its SLR holdings. Together these form a corridor: the MSF rate at the top, the repo rate in the middle, and the deposit rate at the bottom. The Standing Deposit Facility is the newer floor of that corridor. It lets banks deposit surplus with the RBI without receiving securities in exchange, which removes the practical limit the reverse repo had when the RBI's stock of securities ran short. The current rates for all four are in each Monetary Policy Statement on the RBI website.
What the panel is listening for: This is the standard follow-up to the repo question. The panel checks the direction of each flow and whether you know the SDF now forms the floor. No numbers needed; the structure is the answer.
Q23. What is CRR?
Panel: What is the Cash Reserve Ratio?
Likely follow-up: Does the bank earn interest on CRR balances? What happens to credit when CRR rises?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The Cash Reserve Ratio is the share of a bank's net demand and time liabilities, broadly its deposits, that it must keep with the Reserve Bank as cash balances. The bank earns no interest on these balances. The RBI sets the ratio and can change it in a policy statement. Its purpose is twofold: it ensures banks hold a cushion of liquid funds, and it controls how much banks can lend. If the ratio rises, banks must park more with the RBI, so they have less to lend and liquidity tightens. If it falls, lendable funds increase. In a branch you do not calculate CRR, but you feel it: when the RBI raises it, head office pushes branches to mobilise deposits harder, and lending rates may edge up. The current ratio is in the RBI's latest policy statement, which is where I would check before quoting a figure.
What the panel is listening for: The panel listens for "no interest", "with the RBI", the link to deposits and the effect on lending. Candidates often confuse CRR with SLR; keep the two separate.
Q24. What is SLR, and how is it different from CRR?
Panel: What is the Statutory Liquidity Ratio, and how is it different from CRR?
Likely follow-up: Why should a bank be forced to hold government securities at all?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The Statutory Liquidity Ratio is the share of a bank's net demand and time liabilities that it must hold in approved liquid assets: mainly government securities, with gold and cash. The differences from CRR are where the money sits and whether it earns. CRR balances sit with the RBI and earn nothing; SLR assets stay on the bank's own books and earn interest, because government securities pay a coupon. CRR is a pure liquidity and money-supply tool; SLR also ensures the bank holds safe assets it can sell or pledge in a crisis, and it creates steady demand for government borrowing. The case for the mandate is solvency: in a run, a bank with government securities can raise cash quickly through the repo window. The case against is that it directs savings to the government rather than private credit. Both ratios are in the RBI's current policy statement.
What the panel is listening for: The best answers give the comparison in two clean dimensions (where held, whether it earns) and can argue the policy case both ways when pushed.
Q25. What is an NPA?
Panel: What is a non-performing asset, and how is it classified?
Likely follow-up: As a branch officer, what can you do to stop a loan becoming an NPA?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
A loan becomes a non-performing asset when the borrower stops servicing it. Under the RBI's income recognition and asset classification norms, a term loan is NPA when interest or a principal instalment stays overdue beyond ninety days; a cash-credit account, when it is out of order for the same period. Once an account is NPA the bank stops recognising its interest as income and must set aside provisions, which grow as the account ages through the sub-standard, doubtful and loss categories. That is why NPAs hurt profit twice: lost interest and provisions. At the branch, prevention starts before sanction: a proper appraisal and an honest visit. After sanction, it is monitoring: a missed instalment, cheques bouncing, a sudden fall in turnover, and calling the borrower in the first week of default rather than the third month. Most small accounts that become NPA were visibly stressed sixty days earlier.
What the panel is listening for: The ninety-day rule, the provisioning consequence and the branch-level prevention are the three parts the panel wants. Candidates who only define the term are pushed on the follow-up.
Q26. How does UPI work, and what has it changed?
Panel: Explain UPI. How is it different from NEFT or a card payment?
Likely follow-up: If UPI is free for customers, how does anyone pay for the infrastructure?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
UPI is a real-time payment system run by the National Payments Corporation of India. It lets a customer send money from a bank account to any other bank account instantly, around the clock, using a virtual payment address or a QR code, through an app of their choice. The important design choice is that the app and the bank are separate: any UPI app works on any bank account. Compared with a card, there is no card network and no merchant terminal, and the money moves account to account rather than through a credit line. It has changed branch banking visibly: small cash withdrawals have fallen, small merchants who never took cards now take digital payments, and the branch sees more disputes about failed or mistaken transfers. The cost question is real: person-to-merchant UPI is largely free to users, and who bears the infrastructure cost is a live debate.
What the panel is listening for: The panel checks whether you understand the architecture (NPCI, account to account, app independent of bank) and whether you can speak about effects on the branch. The cost follow-up tests whether you read beyond definitions.
Q27. What is CBDC, the digital rupee?
Panel: What is a Central Bank Digital Currency, and how is the digital rupee different from UPI?
Likely follow-up: Why would anyone use it when UPI already works?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
A Central Bank Digital Currency is money issued directly by the central bank in digital form, a liability of the RBI rather than of a commercial bank. The digital rupee, which the RBI has been piloting, is legal tender like a banknote, held in a wallet rather than a bank account. That is the key difference from UPI. A UPI payment moves money between two bank accounts, so it depends on both banks' systems and involves settlement between them. A CBDC payment transfers a token from one wallet to another, like handing over a note, with no bank balance changing. Why use it? It works as cash does, it settles finally and instantly without interbank steps; it could cut the cost of printing and handling cash. The counter-argument is the one in the question: UPI already solves the everyday problem. The RBI's pilot updates say where it stands.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for "liability of the RBI", "wallet not account" and an honest view on adoption. Avoid claiming it is based on a particular blockchain unless you can defend it.
Q28. What is priority sector lending?
Panel: What is priority sector lending, and why does it exist?
Likely follow-up: If a bank fails to meet its priority sector target, what happens?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Priority sector lending is the RBI's requirement that banks lend a set share of their adjusted net bank credit to sectors the economy needs but that commercial lenders would otherwise under-serve. The categories include agriculture, micro, small and medium enterprises, export credit, education, affordable housing, social infrastructure, renewable energy and loans to weaker sections. The rationale is that credit is a public good in a developing economy: without a mandate, a farmer with two acres or a woman starting a tailoring unit would not get a bank loan at a fair rate. A bank that falls short must place the shortfall in funds such as the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund at a low return, a penalty in effect. The exact percentages are in the RBI's master directions on priority sector lending and are revised from time to time, so I would check there first.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants the categories, the reason, and the consequence of a shortfall. Knowing that the targets are set as a share of adjusted net bank credit, and that they are revised, shows reading beyond a coaching sheet.
Q29. What is KYC, and why does it frustrate customers?
Panel: What is KYC? Why do customers find it a nuisance, and what would you tell them?
Likely follow-up: What is the difference between KYC and re-KYC?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Know Your Customer is the set of rules under which a bank verifies who a customer is, where they live and the nature of their business, using officially valid documents, before opening an account and periodically after that. It comes from the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and the RBI's KYC master direction. The purpose is to stop accounts being used for laundering, fraud or terror finance. Customers find it a nuisance because it repeats: they gave documents at opening, and then the bank asks again. That is re-KYC, the periodic update the RBI requires at intervals set by the customer's risk category. What I would tell a customer is simple and true: this protects your money, because the same rule stops a fraudster opening an account in your name. I would also name the one document needed, and say whether video KYC or an online update is available.
What the panel is listening for: Definition, legal basis, purpose and a customer-facing explanation, in that order. The panel is checking whether you can defend a rule to an annoyed customer without hiding behind "it is the rule".
Q30. Functions of the RBI
Panel: What are the main functions of the Reserve Bank of India?
Likely follow-up: Which of those functions affects your branch the most, day to day?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The Reserve Bank has six main functions. It is the monetary authority: it sets the policy rate through the Monetary Policy Committee to control inflation while supporting growth. It regulates and supervises banks and non-banking financial companies, setting prudential norms like capital, asset classification and KYC. It issues currency notes and manages their supply. It is banker to the government, managing its accounts and borrowing. It is banker to the banks, holding their reserves and lending to them at the repo and MSF windows. And it manages the foreign exchange reserves and the exchange rate regime under FEMA. It also has a developmental role in financial inclusion and payments. For a branch, the regulatory function matters most: every KYC form, every NPA classification, every ombudsman complaint and every interest-rate reset traces back to an RBI direction, and a branch officer is, in effect, implementing RBI regulation at the counter.
What the panel is listening for: A list is expected, but the panel scores the follow-up: can you connect regulation to the counter? Mentioning the ombudsman scheme shows you know the customer-protection side.
Q31. NEFT, RTGS and IMPS
Panel: What is the difference between NEFT, RTGS and IMPS?
Likely follow-up: A customer wants to send a large amount urgently on a Sunday evening. What do you advise?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
All three move money between bank accounts electronically, but they differ in timing, amount and who runs them. NEFT, run by the RBI, settles in batches through the day, is now available round the clock, and has no minimum or maximum set by the RBI. RTGS, also run by the RBI, settles each transaction individually and in real time; it is designed for large-value payments, has a minimum amount, and is also available around the clock. IMPS is run by the National Payments Corporation of India, is instant and available at all hours, and is used for smaller retail transfers with a cap set by NPCI and the bank. For a large urgent transfer on a Sunday evening, RTGS is right if the amount is above its minimum; below that, NEFT or IMPS. Current limits and timings are on the RBI and NPCI websites.
What the panel is listening for: Who runs it, when it settles, and the amount band are the three axes. The scenario follow-up tests whether you can turn the comparison into advice.
Q32. Financial inclusion and Jan Dhan
Panel: What is financial inclusion, and what did the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana change?
Likely follow-up: Many Jan Dhan accounts are dormant. Was the scheme a success?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Financial inclusion means every household has access to a basic bank account, affordable credit, insurance and a way to make payments. Before 2014 a large share of Indian households had no account at all, so wages, subsidies and pensions were paid in cash and savings sat at home or with informal lenders. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, launched in August 2014, opened zero-balance accounts on a large scale with a RuPay debit card and accident insurance, and became the rail for direct benefit transfers. On the dormancy criticism, the scheme succeeded at its first purpose, access and a channel for transfers, and only partly at its second, habit. An account that receives a transfer and is emptied the same week is still an account; the next step is credit, overdraft and insurance through it, which is the branch's work. Official figures are on the scheme's portal.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants a definition, the before-and-after, and a balanced view on dormancy. Numbers should come from the official portal, and it is acceptable to say so rather than guess.
Q33. Inflation and how the RBI controls it
Panel: What is inflation, and how does the RBI try to control it?
Likely follow-up: If the RBI raises rates, who loses?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Inflation is a sustained rise in the general level of prices, so each rupee buys less. India measures it mainly through the Consumer Price Index, and the RBI has a legal inflation target set by the government under the flexible inflation-targeting framework, with a band around it. The Monetary Policy Committee meets on a fixed schedule and uses the repo rate as its main tool. When inflation runs above target, it raises the rate; borrowing becomes costlier, demand cools, and over several months price rises slow. The cost of raising rates is real. Borrowers with floating-rate loans pay higher EMIs, small businesses find working capital dearer, and growth slows, so jobs are affected. Savers gain through higher deposit rates. The committee balances those, which is why the framework is called flexible. The target, the band and the current stance are in the RBI's policy documents.
What the panel is listening for: The panel listens for CPI, the inflation-targeting framework, the committee and the transmission mechanism. The follow-up tests whether you can see a policy from the borrower's side.
Q34. Banks versus NBFCs
Panel: How is a bank different from a non-banking financial company?
Likely follow-up: Then why do many customers prefer an NBFC for a two-wheeler or a gold loan?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The core difference is deposits and payments. A bank can accept demand deposits, money repayable on demand through cheques, cards and UPI, and is part of the payment system; a non-banking financial company cannot accept demand deposits or issue cheques on itself. Bank deposits are insured by the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation up to a limit; NBFC deposits are not. Banks must maintain CRR and SLR; NBFCs do not, though both are regulated by the RBI. NBFCs fund themselves largely from banks and the bond market, which is why NBFC stress often becomes bank stress. Customers prefer an NBFC for a two-wheeler or gold loan because it is faster, asks for less paper, sends agents to the customer, and lends to people with thin credit files. The uncomfortable lesson for a bank officer: the product is similar, the service is not. A branch can close that gap.
What the panel is listening for: Deposits, payments, deposit insurance and reserve ratios are the four markers. The follow-up is really about service quality, and a self-critical answer scores.
Q35. How does a bank make money, and what is CASA?
Panel: How does a bank earn profit, and why do managers talk so much about CASA?
Likely follow-up: What is net interest margin?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
A bank earns mainly from the spread: it pays interest on deposits and borrowings, lends and invests at a higher rate, and the difference, after provisions for bad loans and operating costs, is its profit. It also earns fee income from remittances, cards, locker rent, loan processing and distribution of insurance and mutual funds. CASA stands for current account and savings account deposits. Current accounts usually pay no interest and savings accounts pay a low rate, so a bank with a high CASA share has cheaper funds than one that depends on fixed deposits or market borrowing. That cheaper funding widens the spread, which is why branch targets stress CASA. Net interest margin is that spread as a ratio: net interest income divided by average interest-earning assets. A higher CASA share, lower NPAs and good loan pricing all push it up. The bank's annual report shows its actual figures.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants the business model in two sentences and CASA explained as a cost-of-funds issue. Candidates who can define net interest margin correctly on the follow-up stand out.
Q36. What is capital adequacy, in plain words?
Panel: What is capital adequacy, and why does the RBI insist on it?
Likely follow-up: Explain it to a customer who asks whether their bank is safe.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Capital adequacy is the requirement that a bank hold enough of its own capital, meaning shareholders' funds and certain reserves, in proportion to the risk of its assets, so that losses on loans fall on the owners before they fall on depositors. It is measured as a ratio: eligible capital divided by risk-weighted assets. The framework comes from the Basel Committee; the RBI applies it with its own minimums and buffers, set out in its master circular on Basel III capital regulations. The RBI insists on it because a bank lends many times its own capital; without a cushion, a modest share of bad loans would wipe out depositors. To a customer I would say: the regulator makes the bank keep a cushion of its own money against every loan, checks it every quarter, and your deposits are insured up to a limit.
What the panel is listening for: The panel does not expect the Basel pillars in detail. They want the idea of a loss-absorbing cushion, risk weights, and a reassuring but accurate customer version.
Situational and ethics questions (q37 to q45)
Situational questions are where the 30 SBI marks and the 100 IBPS marks are most often decided, because they cannot be memorised. The panel describes a branch problem and watches how you think: do you follow the rule, protect the customer, protect the bank, and still stay human? The reliable frame is calm first, rule second, escalation third, and a sentence about what you would do differently next time. Notice in the follow-ups how often the board raises the pressure ("your probation report depends on it") to see whether the answer holds.
Q37. An angry customer in a long queue
Panel: A customer has been waiting for forty minutes, starts shouting at the counter and other customers join in. You are the officer on the floor. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: The customer demands to see the branch manager, who is in a meeting. Now what?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
First I would walk to the queue rather than call out from my desk, because standing with the customer changes the temperature. I would say, to the person and to the queue, that the wait is unreasonable and I am sorry for it. Then I would fix the cause, not the symptom: find out why the counter is slow, perhaps a system issue or an absent staff member, and either open a second counter myself or move simple transactions such as passbook updates and cash deposits to the kiosk and the deposit machine with a staff member guiding people. For the customer who shouted, I would complete their transaction at my desk, so the queue sees that anger was heard but the solution came from the bank. If they still want the manager, I would say when the manager is free, record the complaint now, and give my name.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is testing composure, ownership and whether you fix causes. Promising what you cannot deliver, or hiding behind the manager, is marked down.
Q38. A senior citizen about to transfer money to a fraudster
Panel: An elderly customer insists on transferring a large amount to an account she has never used, saying a "bank officer" on the phone told her to. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: She says it is her money and you have no right to stop her. Do you process it?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would slow the transaction down without refusing it outright. I would ask her to sit with me for five minutes and tell me exactly what the caller said. Most such calls follow a pattern: urgency, a threat that the account will be blocked, and a demand not to tell anyone. I would explain that no bank officer asks a customer to transfer money to another account to "secure" it, and I would check the beneficiary details in front of her so she sees the fraud for herself. If she still insists, the money is hers and the bank cannot hold it against her will; but I would ask her to sign a declaration that the transfer is on her own instruction, and record the incident. I would also report the beneficiary account through the bank's fraud channel. Often the pause alone ends the scam.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants protection of the customer balanced against her legal right to her money, plus knowledge of the fraud pattern and the reporting channel. A flat "I would refuse" is wrong; so is a flat "I would process it".
Q39. Your branch manager asks you to overlook a rule
Panel: Your branch manager asks you to open an account for an influential local person without the full KYC documents, saying the papers will come later. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: The manager says your probation report depends on cooperation. Now?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would not open the account without the documents, but I would not make it a confrontation either. I would tell the manager, privately, that I understand the customer matters and I want to help, and then offer the fastest compliant route: open the account the same day with whatever officially valid document the customer does have, use video KYC if the bank offers it. Most such requests are really about speed and respect, and both can be given within the rules. If the manager still insists on no documents, I would say clearly that I cannot do that, because the account would be in my name on the system and the rule is the RBI's, not mine, and I would note my position in writing. On the probation threat, I would stay polite; the vigilance channel exists if the pressure continues.
What the panel is listening for: Integrity under hierarchy. The panel is listening for a refusal that is firm, respectful and solution-seeking, and for awareness that the officer, not the manager, carries the account on the system.
Q40. Pressure to mis-sell insurance
Panel: Your branch has an insurance target. A farmer comes to renew a fixed deposit and your colleague tells you to sell him a long-term insurance policy instead. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: If you refuse, the branch misses its target and everyone's incentive suffers. Is that fair to your colleagues?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would separate the target from this customer. A farmer renewing a fixed deposit wants liquidity and safety; a long-term insurance policy locks his money for years and carries surrender charges, so selling it as a deposit substitute is mis-selling. I would renew his deposit as he asked. Then I would do what a good officer does with a target: ask whether he has any insurance at all, explain in his language what term or crop insurance would do for his family, and offer the product that fits, if any. If he says no, that is the end of it. On fairness to colleagues, an incentive built on a customer's confusion is a complaint waiting to happen, and complaints cost the branch more than a missed target. I would also tell the manager that the target should be met with suitable products, not by converting deposits.
What the panel is listening for: The panel tests whether you know what mis-selling is, whether you will refuse it, and whether you can still pursue a target ethically. Self-righteousness towards colleagues is marked down; a constructive line is marked up.
Q41. A relative asks for a loan from your branch
Panel: Your cousin applies for a business loan at the branch where you are the credit officer. How do you handle it?
Likely follow-up: He is genuinely eligible. Are you not punishing him for being related to you?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would declare the relationship to my branch manager in writing on the day the application arrives, before I touch the file, and ask that it be appraised and sanctioned by another officer or at the next higher level, as the bank's conflict-of-interest rules require. I would not process it myself even if he is clearly eligible, because the problem is not his eligibility; it is that any later default, or any later favour, would carry my name. If the file is sound, another officer will sanction it, and my cousin loses nothing except my signature. I would tell him this plainly and in advance so he does not feel obstructed. If he is not eligible, recusing myself also protects the family relationship, because the refusal is the bank's, not mine. The rule protects both officer and borrower, and following it is the kindest thing I can do for him.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for recusal, written disclosure and awareness of the bank's conflict-of-interest policy, delivered without drama. The follow-up checks that you can defend the rule to the person it inconveniences.
Q42. You suspect a colleague of fraud
Panel: You notice that a colleague has been making small transfers from dormant accounts to an account in his wife's name. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: He is a senior clerk with a family, and the amounts are small. Would you really report him?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Yes, I would report it, and do it the right way. First I would make sure of what I had seen: note the account numbers, dates and amounts from the system, without confronting or alerting him, because a confrontation gives him time to reverse entries and makes the evidence harder to use. Then I would take it to the branch manager the same day, in writing, and if the manager was unavailable or involved, to the regional office or the bank's vigilance cell, whose contact details every branch must display. The size of the amounts does not change the answer. Transfers from dormant accounts are theft from customers who are not watching, which is why dormant accounts are flagged as high-risk, and an officer who sees it and stays silent becomes part of it. His family's situation follows from his choice, not from my report.
What the panel is listening for: Evidence first, then the correct channel, then the moral clarity. The panel is checking that sympathy does not become complicity and that you know dormant accounts are a known fraud vector.
Q43. A customer who cannot read the form
Panel: A daily-wage worker comes to open an account. He cannot read or write beyond signing his name, and the branch is busy. How do you handle it?
Likely follow-up: He has only an Aadhaar card. Is that enough?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would treat this as the most important account of the day, not the least, because he is exactly the customer the branch exists for. I would sit him down, fill the form myself in front of him, read each field aloud in his language and confirm it, and take his thumb impression where required, with a witness as the procedure for illiterate customers requires. The RBI's KYC rules allow a single officially valid document with his address on it, and Aadhaar is one, so if the address is current that is sufficient; if he has moved, a self-declaration of the current address is permitted. I would open a basic savings bank deposit account, which has no minimum balance, and explain the passbook, the debit card and the missed-call balance check in words he will remember. Ten minutes now saves him three visits later.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants procedure (witness, thumb impression, officially valid document, basic account) and attitude in equal measure. Knowing the basic savings bank deposit account exists is a strong signal.
Q44. A farmer wants a loan without documents
Panel: A farmer wants a loan to buy a second-hand tractor. He has land but says all his papers are with the village revenue officer. What do you do?
Likely follow-up: He says a private financier will give him the money today. Why should he wait for you?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would first understand the farm: how many acres, what crops, what income in a normal year and a bad year, and whether he already has a Kisan Credit Card with us or another bank. For a tractor loan the bank needs proof of land holding, so I would explain exactly which record is needed, how to get a copy from the revenue office or the state's online land-records portal, and offer the field officer's help. I would also check whether the second-hand tractor can be valued and hypothecated. On the private financier, I would be honest: he can get the money today, at a rate that may be several times ours, with no insurance and his land at risk. A week's wait for a cheaper, safer loan is a good trade, and I would commit to that week.
What the panel is listening for: The panel tests practical knowledge of agricultural lending (land record, KCC, hypothecation, priority sector) and whether you can compete with informal credit on honesty and speed rather than dismiss it.
Q45. Transferred to a state whose language you do not speak
Panel: You are posted to a branch where most customers speak a language you do not know. How will you manage?
Likely follow-up: And in the first week, before you have learnt anything?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would treat the language as part of the job, not an obstacle to it. In the first week I would rely on three things: the local staff, who will translate when it matters; numbers and forms, which are the same in every language; and the fifty words every branch needs, such as account, deposit, withdraw, passbook, loan, interest, sign here and thank you. In the first three months I would take a basic course, practise with the security guard and the tea stall before the branch opens, and keep a notebook of phrases customers use. I have done this before: my college was in a Tamil-speaking town and I arrived with no Tamil; within a term I could manage the hostel, the market and the bus, and within a year I could follow a conversation. Customers forgive an accent if the work is correct.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for a plan with a week-one component, a realistic attitude and ideally a past instance. Saying "English works everywhere" is marked down in a public-sector bank interview.
Current affairs: the method, not the headlines (q46 to q50)
We do not print this month's headlines because they will be stale by your date. What a board tests is a method: can you name what you read, say why it matters to a branch, and hold an opinion without pretending to more than you know? The five answers below show the method on questions that recur every year: how you keep up, today's paper, the Budget, a global event, and an RBI decision you disagree with. Fill them with the week of your interview, from the RBI press releases, the Finance Ministry's PIB releases and one business newspaper.
Q46. How do you keep up with banking news?
Panel: How do you stay informed about the economy and banking?
Likely follow-up: Tell us one thing you read this week that would matter to a branch.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I keep a routine rather than reading randomly. Each morning I read the business pages and the editorial page of one national English daily, and I write three lines on any item touching banking, the RBI or government finance in a notebook. On the day of a Monetary Policy Committee decision I read the RBI's own statement and the Governor's remarks, because the statement says why. Once a month I read the summary of the RBI bulletin and any new master direction that affects branches, such as KYC or digital lending. I follow two bank annual reports, this bank's and one private bank's, to see how they describe the same year differently. This week I read about the RBI's steps on digital payment fraud; what matters to a branch is that a customer's first report must be logged quickly, because the chance of recovery falls with every hour.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is testing whether you have a method and whether you read primary sources. The follow-up catches candidates who claim a habit they do not have; prepare one dated item with a branch-level consequence.
Q47. What did you read in today's newspaper?
Panel: What was the main news in today's paper?
Likely follow-up: And what is your opinion on it?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I will answer with the method I use rather than a scripted headline, because you know what was in today's paper better than I can recite it. On the morning of the interview I read the front page, the business page and one editorial, and I pick one item that touches banking or the economy and one that does not. For each I note the fact, who is affected, and what I think and why. When asked, I give the fact first in two sentences, then the view, and I label the view as mine. If the panel disagrees, I listen. The question is not really about the news; it is about whether I can take a fresh fact and reason about it in front of strangers. Today's item is on the front of my notebook, and I am happy to begin with it.
What the panel is listening for: Candidates rehearse this answer and the panel knows it. Read the paper on the morning of the interview and give the fact before the opinion. The model above is a method, not a script; your actual answer must be about that day's news.
Q48. A point from the latest Union Budget
Panel: Tell us one thing from the latest Union Budget that matters to banks.
Likely follow-up: Do you think it will work?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would pick one measure and explain its chain of effect rather than list the budget. I prepare by reading the Budget speech itself on the Ministry of Finance website, marking every paragraph that mentions credit, deposits, MSMEs, agriculture, digital payments or public-sector bank capital, and asking three questions of each: who pays, who benefits, and what changes at a branch. For example, if the budget raises a credit guarantee limit for small enterprises, the branch effect is that loans up to that limit can be given without collateral, which means more sanctions to first-time borrowers and more monitoring after. If it changes the tax treatment of deposits, the effect is on deposit mobilisation. For the "will it work" follow-up I give one condition under which it works and one under which it does not. Since budgets are annual, I would state the specific measure from the current year's speech.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants one measure, the branch-level chain of effect and a conditional opinion. Quote the current year's speech; candidates who recycle a two-year-old measure are caught immediately.
Q49. How does a global event reach an Indian branch?
Panel: How can an event abroad, say a rate decision by the US Federal Reserve, affect a bank branch in India?
Likely follow-up: Give the chain step by step.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
The chain has four links. First, when the US central bank raises rates, dollar assets pay more, so foreign investors move money out of Indian bonds and shares, and the rupee weakens against the dollar. Second, a weaker rupee makes imports such as oil costlier in rupee terms, which pushes up inflation in India. Third, the RBI responds, either by selling dollars from reserves to steady the rupee, which drains rupee liquidity from the banking system, or by holding or raising its own policy rate so the gap with US rates does not widen. Fourth, that tighter liquidity and higher policy rate reach the branch as higher deposit and lending rates, a push from head office to mobilise deposits, and customers asking why their home-loan EMI has gone up. Within a quarter, a decision in Washington changes conversations at a counter in Jabalpur.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is testing causal reasoning, not memory. A clear chain with the RBI's response in the middle and the branch at the end is the full answer. No current figures are required.
Q50. An RBI decision you disagree with
Panel: Name one recent RBI decision you disagree with, and why.
Likely follow-up: The RBI has far more data than you. Is it not arrogant to disagree?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I would choose a decision where reasonable people differ and argue it with the RBI's own reasoning in view. My method is to read the RBI's statement or press release, state its purpose fairly, and then say which effect I think it under-weights. For instance, when the RBI tightens norms on a category of lending, the stated purpose is to protect the system from a build-up of risk; the cost I would raise is that the first borrowers to lose access are the ones with thin files, who then go to informal lenders. I accept the regulator's judgement on system-wide risk; my disagreement is about sequencing and support for the borrowers affected. It is not arrogant to disagree if you state the other side first and label your view as a view. I would name a current decision from the RBI's press releases.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is testing whether you can hold a view respectfully. State the RBI's rationale first, disagree on one specific point, concede what you do not know. Name a current decision, not one from an old coaching note.
Questions by background: engineers, commerce, arts, working, gap year (q51 to q58)
Your form tells the panel your story before you speak, and the board asks about the part that looks odd: an engineer in a bank, a B.Com who did not try CA, a History graduate facing numbers, a job left, a gap, a fourth attempt. None of these is a disqualification. Each is a test of whether you can describe your own decision without defensiveness. The questions by background page has the longer version for each profile.
Q51. Engineer: why banking after B.Tech?
Panel: You are a B.Tech in Mechanical Engineering. Why banking?
Likely follow-up: Is this not a waste of the country's engineering seat?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I chose Mechanical Engineering at seventeen because it was the respected option in my town, and finished it with a decent aggregate and a project on pump efficiency that a local rice mill used. By the third year I knew two things about myself: I enjoyed the parts of engineering that involved people, costs and decisions more than the parts that involved drawings, and I had been managing my father's shop accounts since school. Banking is where those meet. An engineer brings useful things to a branch: structured problem-solving, comfort with numbers and systems, and the ability to understand the small manufacturing units that are most of a branch's business loans. The degree is not wasted if the training is used; an officer who can read a project's cost estimate and tell a sound unit from a hopeful one uses it every week.
What the panel is listening for: The panel asks this of almost every engineer. They want a non-defensive account of the change of direction and two or three specific ways the degree helps a banker. "There are no engineering jobs" is marked down.
Q52. Commerce graduate: why not CA or MBA?
Panel: You did B.Com. Why banking and not chartered accountancy or an MBA?
Likely follow-up: Did you attempt the CA exams?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I did attempt CA Foundation after my first year and cleared it, and I prepared for Intermediate for a year before deciding not to continue. The honest reason is that the articleship route, three years inside an audit firm, was taking me towards a career of examining other people's businesses from the outside, and what I enjoyed was being inside an organisation making decisions. Banking gives a commerce graduate that directly: appraising a loan is applied accounting, managing a branch's deposits is applied finance, and the career has a clear ladder without a second entrance exam. On the MBA, I would rather enter banking now and do the institute's own certifications, JAIIB and CAIIB, which the industry values for promotion, than spend two years and a large fee to arrive at the same door. The CA preparation was not wasted; it is why I read a balance sheet fast.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is checking whether banking is a first choice or a fallback. Owning the CA attempt, explaining the decision, and naming JAIIB and CAIIB as the in-service route all score.
Q53. Arts or humanities graduate: how will you cope with numbers?
Panel: You studied History. Banking is about numbers. How will you cope?
Likely follow-up: What is the last calculation you did that was not for an exam?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I cleared the same quantitative aptitude and data analysis papers as every other candidate, so the arithmetic is not the issue. What a History degree gives is less visible but just as useful: I read long documents carefully, I can tell a reliable source from a weak one, and I am used to writing a clear note from messy evidence, which is exactly what a credit appraisal or a complaint report is. The hard parts of banking are rarely the calculations; a system does those. The hard parts are judging a borrower, explaining a rule to an angry customer, and writing a file that a sanctioning authority can trust. Those are humanities skills. The last calculation I did outside an exam was last month, working out whether my brother's education loan was cheaper with a shorter tenure and a higher EMI; the saving was larger than he had assumed.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants confidence without defensiveness and a concrete recent use of numbers. Pointing out that the exam already tested arithmetic is a legitimate and strong move if said calmly.
Q54. Working professional: why leave your job?
Panel: You have worked for two years in a private company. Why are you leaving?
Likely follow-up: You will earn less as a PO than you do now. Have you checked?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I have worked for two years as an analyst at a logistics company in Pune so I am not leaving because the job went badly. I am leaving for three reasons. The first is the nature of the work: I prepare reports that someone else decides on; as a PO I would make decisions within my authority from the first year. The second is reach: my company serves a few hundred corporate clients, and a branch serves thousands of people who have no other option. The third is the career path: a public-sector bank has a clear ladder. On pay, I read the officer pay scale in the banks' own recruitment advertisements and compared it with my current package after tax; the entry salary is somewhat lower, but the allowances and the pension scheme narrow the gap. I am making the change with my eyes open.
What the panel is listening for: The panel checks that the move is positive, not an escape, and that the candidate has actually compared the pay. Naming the bank's own advertisement as the source of the pay scale is a good sign.
Q55. Gap year: what were you doing?
Panel: There is a gap of eighteen months after your graduation with nothing on your form. What were you doing?
Likely follow-up: Why should we believe you were preparing and not just sitting at home?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
For the first six months after graduating I was at home in Darbhanga because my mother was being treated for a serious illness and I took her to Patna for appointments; she has recovered. For the next year I prepared for banking examinations full-time. I attempted SBI PO and IBPS PO in the first cycle and missed the prelims cut-off in both by a small margin, mostly on speed in reasoning. I changed my method: a timed mock every morning, error analysis every evening, and a notebook of mistake types that I still carry. In the second cycle I cleared both prelims and this mains. I also taught mathematics to two neighbourhood children, which paid for my test series. I would not call the gap empty. It contained a family responsibility I would take again, and a failure I learnt from; the notebook shows how.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants an honest, specific account with evidence of structure and some productive activity. A gap explained calmly with a visible outcome is not a negative; a vague or defensive answer is.
Q56. Leaving IT: will you leave banking the same way?
Panel: You left a software job after one year. If you get bored of banking, will you leave that too?
Likely follow-up: What was actually wrong with the software job?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I left the software job because of what the work was, not because I get bored easily. The role was maintenance of a legacy system for an overseas client, night shift, with no customer contact and no decision beyond closing tickets. I stayed a full year, finished my commitments, and left with a good relieving letter. What I wanted was work with a visible result for a person I could see, and banking is that: a loan sanctioned is a shop opened; a fraud stopped is a pensioner's savings kept. The two situations are not alike. A PO's work changes every two or three years by design, through rotation across desks and postings, so the sameness that drove me out of software is structurally absent. I also understand the bank invests in training a PO, and leaving in the first years would be a breach of that.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is assessing stability. A specific, non-bitter account of the old job plus a structural reason why banking differs scores; vague talk of "passion" does not.
Q57. Family responsibilities and transfers
Panel: You are married and your spouse works in another city. How will you handle transfers and rural postings?
Likely follow-up: And if the bank cannot accommodate a request?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
We discussed this before I applied, because it would be unfair to the bank and to my spouse to discover the problem after joining. We have agreed on three things. First, for the probation and the first rural posting, I will go where I am posted and we will manage the distance. Second, after that, I will use the bank's transfer policy as it is written, including the provision for spouse postings where it exists, and request a location through the proper channel, not through influence. Third, if the bank cannot accommodate the request, my spouse's work is portable enough to move closer within a year or two. My spouse's job is a strength for the bank, not a complication: as a two-income household I am not under pressure to chase quick incentives. I will not ask for exceptions, and I will not let the question affect the work.
What the panel is listening for: The panel wants evidence that the candidate has planned, knows the transfer policy exists and will not seek exceptions. A direct answer to "if the bank cannot accommodate" is essential. The same question is asked of men and women; prepare it either way.
Q58. This is your fourth attempt. Why keep trying?
Panel: This is your fourth attempt at a bank PO exam. Why do you keep trying, and what changed this time?
Likely follow-up: Would you not have been better off taking a private job three years ago?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I keep trying because the job has not become less worth having, and because each attempt has been measurably better than the last. In the first two attempts I failed at prelims on speed. In the third I cleared prelims and failed mains, mainly on the descriptive paper and data interpretation. This time I rebuilt my preparation around those two: I wrote one essay or letter every day for six months and I did data interpretation sets under time every morning. Those marks improved enough to bring me here. On the private job, I did take one, part-time, as an accounts assistant at a transport firm for two years; it paid for my preparation and taught me how a small business actually uses a bank. I would rather be a banker at twenty-seven who understood the customer's side first than one at twenty-three who did not.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is checking persistence with learning, not stubbornness. Naming what failed each time and what changed is the whole answer. Working alongside preparation is read positively.
Regional and local-economy questions (q59 to q64)
Public-sector banks post officers to districts, so boards check whether you see the economy around you: your state, a crop or industry, the banks in your district and the lead bank, what the place is known for, and one problem a branch could help with. The Hindi-medium question sits here too, because it is asked most often of candidates from the Hindi belt. The best answers name one specific product (Kisan Credit Card, a self-help group linkage, a working-capital limit) and one honest obstacle.
Q59. Describe the economy of your state
Panel: Tell us about the economy of your state.
Likely follow-up: What is the biggest problem a bank could help solve there?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
I am from Odisha, and I would describe its economy in three layers. The base is agriculture, mainly paddy, with many small and marginal farmers who depend on the monsoon and on minimum support price procurement. The second layer is minerals and heavy industry: iron ore, bauxite and coal in the western and northern districts, with steel and aluminium plants and the ports at Paradip and Dhamra. The third is the newer services and IT activity around Bhubaneswar and the handloom clusters such as Sambalpuri weaving. The gap a bank can help with is in the middle: the state has large industrial projects and millions of tiny farms, but few mid-size enterprises that create local jobs, and a weaver or a small food processor often cannot get working capital without collateral. Government credit guarantee schemes for MSMEs exist for exactly this. State figures are in the Odisha Economic Survey.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for structure, for correct named sectors and places, and for a banking angle. Numbers should be sourced to the state economic survey; a candidate who says so rather than guessing a percentage is marked up.
Q60. A local crop or industry and how a bank serves it
Panel: Name one crop or industry from your district and explain how a bank serves it.
Likely follow-up: What goes wrong in that lending, in your experience?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
My district is Guntur in Andhra Pradesh, and the crop is chilli. The cycle runs from sowing after the monsoon to harvest in the early months of the year, with a large regulated market yard in Guntur where traders buy. A bank is present at every stage. The farmer takes a Kisan Credit Card loan for inputs and repays after the sale; the cold-storage owner takes a term loan for the building and a working-capital line against stock; the trader takes a pledge loan against warehouse receipts; and the exporter needs pre-shipment and post-shipment credit and foreign-exchange services. What goes wrong is price risk: a glut year halves the price, the farmer cannot repay, and the KCC turns overdue. Crop insurance and warehouse-receipt finance help, because they let a farmer hold stock rather than sell at the bottom. I have seen both work and fail in my extended family.
What the panel is listening for: The panel tests local knowledge turned into banking products: KCC, pledge loans, warehouse receipts, export credit. Any district works; the depth of the chain is what is scored.
Q61. Hindi-medium candidate: will you manage English?
Panel: You studied in Hindi medium. Banking records, circulars and many customers use English. Will you manage?
Likely follow-up: Answer the next question fully in English, then.
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Yes, and I would rather show you than promise you. I studied in Hindi medium until class twelve and in a Hindi-speaking college, so my spoken English is a skill I built after twenty, not one I grew up with. For two years I have read an English newspaper every day, written a short note on it in English, and practised speaking aloud every evening, because I knew this question would come. I understand written English fully; the mains examination itself tested that. My speaking has an accent and sometimes a wrong tense, as you can hear, but I can explain a product, handle a complaint and write a clear note in English, and I am improving every month. Where I am likely to be posted, Hindi will be the working language, and that is a strength. If the panel prefers, I will answer the rest in English.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is measuring confidence and clarity, not accent. Neither the SBI advertisement nor the IBPS notification fixes an interview language; in practice boards accept Hindi and English. Offering to continue in English, and then doing it adequately, usually settles the point.
Q62. Banks in your district and the lead bank
Panel: Which banks operate in your district, and what is the lead bank scheme?
Likely follow-up: What does the lead bank actually do that others do not?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
In my district, Nadia in West Bengal, most public-sector banks have branches, with State Bank of India and the regional rural bank having the widest rural presence, along with the district cooperative bank and its primary societies at village level, and private banks mostly in Krishnanagar, Ranaghat and Kalyani. Under the Lead Bank Scheme, which the RBI introduced in 1969, one bank is designated lead bank for each district and coordinates credit planning there. In practice the lead district manager chairs the District Consultative Committee with government departments and the other banks, prepares the annual credit plan that sets district lending targets for agriculture and small enterprises, monitors how far branches have met them, and runs financial literacy and inclusion drives such as account-opening and insurance enrolment camps. Which bank leads a given district is listed on the RBI's website, and I would confirm it there before quoting it.
What the panel is listening for: The panel expects the local banking map, the purpose of the scheme and the committee structure. Saying you would verify the lead bank on the RBI list, rather than guessing, is correct and not a weakness.
Q63. What is your district known for?
Panel: What is your district famous for?
Likely follow-up: Does that bring any business to a bank, or is it just a fact for tourists?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
Madurai is known first for the Meenakshi Amman temple, which draws visitors through the year and especially during the Chithirai festival, and for being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the country. It is also known for jasmine, the Madurai malli, which has a geographical indication tag, and for a strong base of small industries: textiles and ready-made garments, rubber products, and automobile component units in the surrounding areas. Each of those is banking business, not only a tourist fact. The temple economy means thousands of small shops, lodges and transport operators that need current accounts, QR payments and small working-capital loans. The jasmine trade means seasonal credit for growers and traders and, increasingly, export finance. The component units need term loans and bank guarantees. An officer who understands the local cycle, when flower prices peak and when garment orders arrive, can time products and recovery to it.
What the panel is listening for: A light question with a serious follow-up. The panel marks the second half: can you see the economy behind the landmark? Facts about GI tags or festivals should be ones you can defend.
Q64. One local problem a bank can help solve
Panel: Name one problem in your district that a bank branch could help solve.
Likely follow-up: Why has it not been solved already, then?
Model answer (TalkDrill worked example)
In my part of Marathwada the problem is seasonal migration for sugarcane cutting. Every winter families leave for the cane fields in western Maharashtra and Karnataka, taking an advance from the labour contractor that ties them to him at a poor rate and leaves children out of school. A branch cannot stop migration, but it can change its terms. If a household has a working account with a small overdraft or a self-help group linkage, the pre-season advance can come from the bank rather than the contractor, wages can be paid into the account rather than netted off, and the family keeps the surplus. It has not happened partly because the households are seen as too small and mobile to be worth a loan, and partly because the contractor is faster. The answer is a branch that treats the self-help group as a real customer and visits before the season.
What the panel is listening for: The panel is listening for a real, local problem, a specific banking mechanism, and an honest account of why it is hard. The follow-up checks whether you understand the obstacles or only the idea.
The ten most asked, and the one thing each tests
If you have one evening, prepare these ten. They appear in some form in almost every SBI and IBPS board, and each tests one thing the panel is scoring.
| # | Question | The one thing it tests | Prepared answer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tell me about yourself | Structure and one concrete recent activity | q01 |
| 2 | Why banking? | A reason that is yours, not the room's | q07 |
| 3 | Why PO and not SO, clerk or RBI? | Whether you understand the job | q08 |
| 4 | Tell us about your hometown | Whether you observe the economy around you | q02 |
| 5 | What is the repo rate? | Concept plus the honest "the current figure is in the latest MPC statement" | q21 |
| 6 | CRR and SLR | Precision, and whether you know which one earns | q23, q24 |
| 7 | What is an NPA? | Classification plus what a branch officer can do | q25 |
| 8 | An angry customer or a fraud victim at the counter | Calm, rule, escalation, humanity | q37, q38 |
| 9 | Your manager asks you to bend KYC | Integrity under pressure | q39 |
| 10 | Will you work in a rural branch? | Honesty about mobility; everyone says yes, few can say how | q11 |
Practice route: from reading to speaking
Reading answers improves reading. Interviews are spoken, under eye contact, with interruptions. The route below moves you from the page to the room in the weeks between the Main result and the interview; it is written as twenty-one days and compresses if your call letter gives you fewer.
- Days 1 to 8: one group a day. Read the group, write your four lines for each question, record each answer once. Use the AI mock interview with "Bank PO" as the role so the follow-ups come from your answer rather than a fixed list.
- Days 9 to 14: follow-ups only. Have a friend, or the AI, ask only the counterpart questions from this page. If you cannot answer one, your first answer was too thin; go back and add the one true thing.
- Days 15 to 18: full mocks. Twenty minutes, no notes, in interview clothes. Read the three mock transcripts first so you know what a full board sounds like, then do your own. SBI candidates add two group discussion sessions for the Group Exercise.
- Days 19 to 21: the week's news and the file. Read the latest RBI policy statement and the week's banking news, write the live figures inside your document file, and re-record the five current-affairs-method answers with this week's material. Check the documents and interview day page the night before.
Two offline companions: the HR interview questions and answers book for the personal questions, and the interview guide for freshers for candidates whose first interview this is.
Sources
- SBI PO 2026-27 detailed advertisement, CRPD/PO/2026-27/09: Phase III structure (Group Exercise 20, Interview 30, total 50), qualifying marks "as decided by the Bank", normalisation of Main (230) and Phase III (50) to 75 and 25. Read 19 October 2026.
- SBI notice: tentative dates for Psychometric Test, Group Exercise and Interviews: psychometric test 31.10.2026; Group Exercise and Interviews from 18.11.2026 onwards; call letters "shortly". Read 19 October 2026.
- IBPS CRP PO/MT-XVI detailed notification (PDF), section J, Interview: 100 marks, qualifying "not less than 40% (35% for SC/ST/OBC/PwBD candidates)", weightage 80:20, Personality Test November 2026, interviews November/December 2026, provisional allotment January 2027. Read 19 October 2026 and re-checked 20 October 2026. If the direct link fails, open it from the IBPS home page.
- Reserve Bank of India: the Monetary Policy Statements and press releases where the current repo rate, SDF, MSF, CRR and SLR are published. No rate is quoted on this page. The RBI's Master Circular on the Lead Bank Scheme (1 October 2026) is the source for the December 1969 date in q62, read 20 October 2026.
- Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana: the scheme's own brochure on pmjdy.gov.in records the announcement on 15 August 2014 and Phase I from that date, the source for the August 2014 date in q32, read 20 October 2026.
Last checked 20 October 2026. The dates block at the top of this page is rendered from our exam calendar and is re-checked weekly.