The bank was also offering gifts ranging from bicycles and gift vouchers for new Hapan branded children's accounts and was launching a new Sthree branded accounts targeted at female savers through the postal service.
General manager Sunil Perera said the savings drive had no specific deposit targets but it is intended to broaden awareness and deepen the savings habit of people in Sri Lanka.
Chairman Upali Gunaratne said there were complaints that the bank's interest rates were too low but a recent collapse of a high interest rate deposit scheme showed the dangers of going after "bogus" very high interest rates.
Gunaratne said rural savers wanted a safe route to deposit their money and NSB had a high 'AAA(lka)' rating at a time when global banks were under pressure.
The bank's recently launched 'Happy' branded savings account which gave higher intere