J. Balaji
NEW DELHI: The two-day nationwide strike called by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), the umbrella organisation of nine bank unions, began on Thursday, with the public put to great hardship as regular transactions were affected in public sector banks.
However, the functioning of ATMs and major private banks, including foreign banks like HDFC, Standard Chartered, ICICI, HSBC and Citibank, gave customers some relief.
As the strike in the public sector banks was total, including in New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, cheque clearing operations, foreign currency as well as money market operations and government transactions were badly hit.
Employees of private sector banks such as the Federal Bank, the Karnataka Bank, the South Indian Bank, the ING Vysya Bank and the Lakshmi Vilas Bank too joined the stir as some of their staff are governed by the wage settlement process with the Indian Banks Association.
The UFBU alleges that the IBA, besides not agreeing to a wage hike to the extent demanded by the unions, has retracted from its earlier stand that the existing pension scheme will be extended to the remaining employees who are now in the PF scheme.
The UFBU claims that 10 lakh employees, including officers, are participating in the strike; and services in about 60,000 bank branches have been affected.
‘Agitation unprecedented’
All-India Bank Officers Association general secretary S.S. Shishodia, in a press release, claimed that the strike was a complete success. “It is unprecedented in nature and magnitude, with all the branches across the country being shut down. Banking operations throughout India came to a halt,” he said.
If the government did not heed the demand of the UFBU, it would meet in Chennai on August 11 and decide the next course of action, he warned.
This is the next strike, this time by the bank employees, after the pay commission awards.
The minimum salary of the lowest paid employee of any bank is not less than Rs 15000.00 per month, if we consider all the allowances they receive. Further they get loans at almost nil rate of interest for any and every personal reason.
When you consider that 40% of the people living in India earn less than Rs 300.00 per month, I think a stop should be made to these pay commissions awards.
As it is all of them are covered for any rise is prices by DA and other allowances, which increases or decreases (very seldom) every quarter.
Every five years it creates animosity and competition between different wings of government and semi government organisations and productivty suffers.
The government can afford to give the awards since it prints the notes. But these employees consist of hardly 10% of the popultion of India.
The balance 90 % of the population is made to bear the brunt of the inflationery pressures which make everything more expensive by the amount of awards given by the pay commission.
I wonder which leg of the government will go on strike next?
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