Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and Reserve Bank of India Governor Y.V. Reddy met here Saturday to fine tune norms for foreign banks to acquire stake in domestic private banks.

The meeting, which lasted over two hours, came after the finance minister's earlier statement that foreign banks would be permitted to acquire up to 74 percent stake in their domestic private sector counterparts progressively.

The central bank had been mandated to prepare the roadmap for this process.

"We dotted the i's and crossed the t's," Chidambaram said after the meeting with Reddy. The new entry norms, he said, were expected to be unveiled early next week after securing the approval of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

The draft guidelines currently allow up to 49 percent foreign equity in domestic private sector banks, but voting rights are restricted to 10 percent.

As part of the next phase of financial sector reforms - including strengthening of India's public sector banks - Chidambaram had favoured acquisition of up to 10 percent equity per annum in Indian private banks by foreign counterparts.

He had said the economic ownership in domestic banks should be reflected in the voting rights for which parliament would have to enact a law.

India has 29 private sector banks operating in the country and at least 15 of them are seeking to raise finances in the near future, industry sources said.