If you thought that sportspersons in the country are still being offered jobs by public sector banks, think again.

The liberalisation wave that swept India in the 1990s has ensured that public sector banks, which once were one of the most liberal employment providers, have all frozen sports quota recruitments.

For nearly five years now, young and talented sportspersons in the country have been a frustrated lot because of lack of job opportunities in almost all the state-owned institutions. This apart, with the banks implementing voluntary retirement schemes to reduce their bloated staff strength, it just did not make sense for them to recruit employees for their sports skills.

Though a smattering of sportspersons in games like tennis, chess, shooting, weightlifting, boxing and table tennis have managed to get jobs here and there, the overall picture is rather bleak.

Of the three main banks in Andhra Pradesh that used to recruit sportspersons -- State Bank of [Get Quote] India [Get Quote], State Bank of Hyderabad and Andhra Bank [Get Quote] -- none have recruited any sportsperson for the last many years. In fact, Andhra Bank is in the middle of overhauling its hiring policy under this category.

According to K S N Murthy, assistant general manager (personnel and HRD department), State Bank of India, the decline in the recruitment numbers of sportspersons had more to do with the Banks Sports Control Board rule.

Murthy points out that as per the rule, the banks can appoint only one sportsperson for the recruitment of every 100 clerks. "With the banks not appointing any new clerks in the recent past, how can they recruit sportspersons?" he said.

R Kesavan, deputy general manager (personnel and HRD department), State Bank of Hyderabad, points out that one of the primary reasons why new recruitments have not taken place is because there are no upsides to productivity or business for banks from such employees.

SBH, for example, has even reduced the number of sports teams that participate in the domestic cricket league.

"We used to have two cricket teams and one football team last year but at present we have one cricket team of fourteen members and a coach and a team for football of 19 members including the coach," he said.

"While one is away on sports duties, it is difficult for another to chip in. Sportspersons were recruited for doing various back office works but nowadays with modernisation and computerisation there is a decline in the manpower required for the back office work which has affected the recruitment," he said.

Although the recruitments have come down, the allocations for sports, however, may increase. SBH, which has allocated Rs 15 lakh for the current financial year, expects the allocation to go up in the next fiscal. 

According to Kesavan, SBH though was looking at some fresh sports related recruitments. "We are looking at expanding the portfolio from the present two sports to other games like table tennis, badminton and chess," he said.

SBH is looking at inducting around five sportspersons in the next six months. However, according to Kesavan, although the plans have been formulated to give a fillip to sports, ultimately it depends on the profits of the bank.