ESAF Microfinance
 | |
| Bank-SFB | |
| Industry | Banking |
| Founded | 2017 |
| Headquarters | Thrissur, India |
Area served | India |
Key people | K. Paul Thomas, Raveendranathan Prabha |
| 2800 Crore | |
Number of employees | 3,750 (2017) |
| Website | www.esafbank.com |
Evangelical Social Action Forum, better known as ESAF Microfinance, is a non-banking finance company and microfinance institution (NBFC-MFI), licensed by the Reserve Bank of India and headquartered in Thrissur City of Kerala. ESAF Small Finance Bank is the first bank to be given a banking license in Kerala since independence.[1][2][3] ESAF Microfinance is the first microfinance institution in Kerala and started its micro-credit lending in 1995.
History and operations
On March 11, 1992, K. Paul Thomas, along with Mereena Paul and a few friends, started ESAF in a small house in Mannuthy named "Little". Jacob Samuel, one of the co-founders, coined the name ESAF, which is an acronym for Evangelical Social Action Forum. At inception, ESAF had five life members, seven annual members and eight honorary members. ESAF society was registered under the Travancore Cochin Literary, Scientific and Charitable Societies Registration Act. The initial president was Itty Mathew; J. Danabai was the vice president. Thomas was the secretary supported by Samuel as joint secretary and Arun Ramakrishnan as treasurer. In March 2017 Pinarayi Vijayan, Chief Minister of Kerala officially inaugurated ESAF Small Finance Bank at Thrissur, Kerala. In 2017, the company had around 3750 employees and a presence in 11 states.
References
- ↑ "RBI issues Small Finance Bank license to ESAFurl". Business Standard. November 18, 2016. Retrieved 2016-12-17.
- ↑ "ESAF ties up with FIS for micro finance bank". Economic Times. November 24, 2016. Retrieved 2016-12-17.
- ↑ "The small finance bank will be profitable within first year of operations: K Paul Thomas". Business Standard. June 16, 2016. Retrieved 2016-12-17.