He's just finished a meeting with the promoter of a large Indian corporation who wants to raise half a billion dollars and is sitting in his 5th-floor office in Mumbai's Bandra-Kurla commercial complex. Business is flowing in for us, says Sanjay Nayar, the dapper 46- year-old CEO of Citigroup's Indian operations and Area Head for Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. The spacious room has a busy air about it and is cluttered with dozens of coffee table books but that doesn't seem to bother Nayar, who is squeezing in meeting after meeting into his busy day. A client here, a colleague there, a couple of exit interviews...

Nayar's just back from a meeting with Citigroup's global CEO, Vikram Pandit in Citi's New York headquarters, where things are far more down-tempo than they are here in India. There Pandit, 51, who took charge at the bank in December 2007, is grappling with the onerous task of restructuring Citi's global balance sheet. The biggest bank in the US has been hit hard by the subprime crisis with losses and writedowns mounting close to $50 billion since mid-2007. What's scaring Citibankers in India and elsewhere is Pandit's declaration that he wants to sell assets worth $400 billion over the next three years. Recently, the bank sold its German banking operations for $7.7 billion to France's Credit Mutuel and speculation is rife about a possible offloading of Citi's non-core assets in Japan.

Back in India, Nayar, too, has his plate full, although Citi's Indian operations are far better off than what its global situation looks like. Still, his troubles are irksome. Recently, three key Citi executives left the bank Rajesh Mayani, Director of institutional sales, Ratnesh Kumar, head of research and Narayan Mulchandani, director (sales), in Hong Kong, signed up with a local Indian stockbroking firm, Anand Rathi Securities. Besides these, two others, Anil Gudibande, director and Ashish Pitale, director, global banking, moved to AIG Private Equity and Deutsche Bank, respectively.

Nayar, a 23-year Citi veteran, is concerned about these exits. I'm never happy about losing people. I take people exits very seriously, says Nayar, throwing his hands up in despair. Adds Citi's HRD head Ian Gore, downplaying the recent attrition a bit: Citi has always been a natural target for industry to source talent.

Keeping his flock together is quite evidently high priority for Nayar because stability of Citi's Indian business is vital for the bank's global operations as well. In the next month or so, Pandit is expected to visit India for the first time since he took charge at the bank. Pandit's predecessor, Chuck Prince, who visited India in March 2007, had famously called India the bank's single-biggest driver of growth for the group's international operations.As Nayar prepares for his boss's visit, Citi also has to deal with the vexing question of how it deals with its rapidly growing operations in emerging markets like India, which are in sharp contrast with what is happening in the developed markets.

One scenario, often speculated in the market, is that Citi has little choice but to scale down Indian operations to tide over the crisis by trimming costs. Another scenario could be to go in the opposite direction and step on the gas in the faster growing emerging markets like India, China, Mexico and Brazil.

For now, it isn't very clear which option the Citigroup's management will adopt. That sort of uncertainty has Citi India's 22,000 employees more than a little worried about their future. A proposal to link their annual bonuses with the overall global performance of the bank is also a hot topic of discussion among them. Says Gore: We have ensured that employees here know exactly what's happening in the organisation and also the strategy to properly position ourselves.