India’s public sector lender, Canara Bank said it will open a branch in Johannesburg, South Africa by December as part of its plan to expand its overseas branch network during this fiscal year, with plans for similar moves  in Frankfurt, Germany.

According to Canara Bank chairman and Managing Director, Shri R K Dubey, the bank has already obtained the necessary regulatory approvals in South Africa.

“We have received approval from Reserve Bank of India and Central Bank of South Africa to open our first branch in South Africa by December this year. Our officials were in Johannesburg last week to finalise the location and building,” Dubey said.

Aside the proposed branch establishment in South Africa and Germany, Canara Bank plans to open branches at 12 other overseas centres – DIFC (Dubai), Sao Paulo (Brazil), Dar-es-Salaam (Tanzania), Tokyo (Japan), Abuja (Nigeria), Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), Qatar Financial Centre (Qatar), New York (USA), Sydney(Australia), Ontario (Canada), Wellington (New Zealand) and Singapore by March 2015.

“We have got approval from the Reserve Bank of India to open branches in New York, Tokyo, Nigeria, Tanzania, Brazil and Jeddah and are working on modalities to open them soon,’’ R.K. Dubey said in May, this year.

Headquartered in Bangalore, Karnataka, Canara Bank is one of India’s foremost Bank with 3,800 branches in India. It hopes to achieve a milestone of 5,000 branches in the next one and a half year.