BLS International rose almost 11% to an intraday high at Rs.196, just Rs.11 away from its 52-week high of Rs.207.

A global visa service provider for government and diplomatic missions worldwide, announced yesterday that through its wholly owned subsidiary BLS E-services, it acquired 100% equity stake of Zero Mass Pvt Ltd for Rs.120 crore, funded entirely via internal accruals.

Zero Mass, headquartered in Mumbai is the largest business correspondent (BS) in the country and now with this acquisition, BLS has become the largest business correspondent network in India.

Zero Mass has been operating the largest BC network for SBI, with around 11,500 active CSPs (15% of all the SBI BCs). It has contracts with Utkal Grameen Bank and Karur Vysya Bank; it today accounts for 5%-6% of the bank accounts, deposit base and aggregate value of transaction of the BC system in India. This acquisition is expected to strengthen BLS’s vertical of BS and expand its outreach into rural India, providing the last mile banking link.

Additionally, this week, it was authorized by the Royal Thai Consulate-General, Mumbai for processing Thai visa’s.