Citi India has appointed Rahul Soota as head of retail and commercial banking. Mr Soota will be responsible for Citi’s branch banking and citigold wealth management, mortgages and suvidha businesses.

Mr Soota will also lead Citi’s commercial banking business spanning the business and professional, small and mid market enterprise segments. Mr Soota will report jointly to N Rajashekaran, country business manager of global consumer group at Citi India and Gaurang Hattangdi, head of commercial banking at Citi Asia Pacific.

Mr Soota joined the bank in 1992 upon completion of his articleship at Pricewaterhouse. Mr Soota has worked in financial control, personal loans, mortgages and business lending. Some of the key assignments Mr Soota has held during his nearly 20 years at Citi are head of mortgages and head of retail bank. Prior to being named head of retail and commercial bank, Mr Soota was managing director of Citifinancial where he led two-year long remodeling and repositioning exercise helping diversify its sources of revenue across personal loans, mortgages and wealth management.

Mr Rajashekaran said: “Mr Soota appointment emphasizes the tremendous opportunity we see in our consumer and commercial banking franchise in the country. Under his leadership, we will strengthen our focus on driving success for our clients by serving stronger value propositions. With his track record, he is well positioned to pull our strengths together on one platform and in one team to derive customer-centric synergies that encompass all the personal and business banking needs of our customers.”

Mr Hattangdi said: “We see the commercial banking space as a tremendous opportunity for Citi in Asia and in India and we are committed to growing our presence in this space where today, we have over 200,000 clients across Asia Pacific. The new integrated commercial bank provides us with a superior ability to serve customers ranging from small and mid-sized companies, their owners and employees the entire breadth of the firm’s market-leading corporate and wealth management products via a unified operating platform.”