He is a true 24x7 banker. It's a job that keeps him on his toes all the time, day and night. As CEO for Citigroup-India, and the Area Head for Citigroup operations in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, Sanjay Nayar doesn't have any proper work schedule. It is a 24-hour job and his endeavour is to ensure the leading position of the Citibank. A Mechanical Engineer from Delhi University, Nayar earned his MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad. He worked as a Design Engineer in the UK before joining Citigroup in 1985.

He worked in the Fixed Income Group across Salomon Smith Barney (SSB) and Citicorp Securities, and was responsible for the emerging markets business in SSB New York for five years covering fixed income currencies and derivatives. Nayar was responsible for the post-merger integration of Citibank and Salomon Smith investor businesses in New York (1998) for Citibank and Travelers Group. Nayar's tenure in Citibank has seen him take up various assignments in Citigroup Capital Markets worldwide in London (1994-96), and New York (1996-2001), before being posted to India in October 2001, a country where Citibank has an over a hundred years of history.

He was also responsible for the integration of the Citibank derivatives and local market products with SSB's dollar fixed income platform. Prior to that, he was in London for three years heading the Emerging Markets Equities for Citibank London. H e was also the global sales head for Fixed Income Emerging Markets Business at Salomon Smith Barney. As CEO of Citibank India, Nayar has to oversee the group's key businesses which consist of consumer banking, corporate & investment banking, a financial services BPO-eServe, the venture capital businesses, and the local private bank.

It was during Nayar's tenure that Citigroup IT Operations & Solutions Ltd (CITOS), a Citigroup company, opened a Global IT center in Malad. CITOS, which provides critical technology infrastructure support, also develops and deploys strategic software applications for Citigroup entities worldwide. Spread over 47,000 square feet with a seating capacity of over 450, this Global IT center will primarily manage and support Citigroup's IT infrastructure - system administration, database administration, information security and network monitoring- for various Citigroup businesses across the world, a statement said.

Citigroup has played a pioneering role in developing India as an outsourcing hub globally and now CITOS is already actively working in the rapidly growing domain of technology infrastructure services with its 1100 staff providing high quality, secure, remote infrastructure support services to Citigroup businesses around the world.

This is the fourth IT Center that CITOS has set-up in a short span of two years since it began operations in January 2005. CITOS now has 2 facilities each in Mumbai and Chennai, with a total capacity to seat 1800 people per shift. The opening of this new Global IT Center will further create opportunities for Indian talent to work with the latest mission critical and cutting edge applications in the technology intensive financial services domain. Citigroup's global reach, strong technology platform, systems and operational expertise in financial services helps employees gain a global perspective and understanding which is unique.

Under Nayar's leadership and guidance, Citibank has consolidated its position to become the leading international bank in the subcontinent. He believes in 'the capacity to achieve the impossible'. With this motto, Nayar directed initiatives across the corporate, treasury and capital market activities. It might look tough but it ids not so for Nayar. He relishes it. After all, he never tires of saying, "In today's competitive world, there are many times when one feels dejected with a single failure, but as did the spider in King Bruce's prison; try, try and try again till you succeed. That is what an achiever does."