Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB), the troubled private sector lender, on Thursday said it has received an “indicative non-binding” offer from Aion-backed Clix Group for a merger.

LVB was in the news last month when its shareholders voted out seven directors on its board, including CEO S. Sundar and promoters K.R. Pradeep and N. Saiprasad.

Subsequently, the RBI appointed a three-member team to run the bank under Meeta Makhan as chairperson and Shakti Sinha and Satish Kumar Kalra as members.

In a regulatory filing on Thursday, the bank’s chief financial officer K. Hariharan said, “Further to the process of evaluating a proposed amalgamation with Clix Capital Services, Clix Finance and Clix Housing Finance, we are glad to inform that the bank has received an indicative non-binding offer from Clix Group.”

The filing did not provide any details on the offer.

On September 15, LVB had agreed to an amalgamation with Clix Capital Group, a mid-sized non-banking lender, in an all-share deal.

Earlier, the bank had tried to merge with Indiabulls Housing Finance but the RBI had objected to the merger proposal.

In June, the bank and Clix Group had entered into a non-binding agreement for amalgamation and later the parties extended the validity of the agreement to September 15 citing the nationwide lockdown.

Against a minimum required tier-I capital ratio of 8.8 per cent, the ratio for LVB stood at 1.88 per cent at the end of the June quarter. At the end of March, it was even lower at 0.88 per cent.

Last week, the bank, which is under the RBI’s prompt corrective action (PCA), had announced that its board had approved fundraising plans for Rs 1,500 crore and also to increase foreign shareholding up to 74 per cent from the current 12.35 per cent.

The bank had suffered a net loss of Rs 112.28 crore in the June quarter against a loss of Rs 237.25 crore.

Its asset quality deteriorated with gross non-performing assets (NPAs) rising to 25.40 per cent of the gross advances as from 17.30 per cent in the earlier quarter.

If the merger happens, the networth of the bank is expected to more than double to Rs 3,100 crore from the current Rs 1,200 crore.

Ahead of the announcement, shares of the lender rallied 7.23 per cent to close at Rs 17.80 on the BSE, giving it a market valuation of Rs 599.35 crore.