Bank Strike in India on 6th and 7th August

Not to worry about drawing personal cash as long as ATMs are in operation. The main banking suffers in business sector where millions of rupees are drawn and deposited every day. These businessmen have to take risk of keeping the entire money in their shops for 2 days. Risks are higher, as amounts will be higher due to Raksha Bandhan falling on the 5th.

In democracy, strikes are legitimate – always so. If doctors who save lives can go on strike, then others have no fault at all, I feel so. Banks think very little about customers. Actually not only banks, when it comes to our own problems, we seldom think of others. Today each and every sector is going on strike, whenever they like.

Pension Option and Wage Pact in Banks

The conciliation talks held at N Delhi at the behest of the Labour Commissioner on 4th August 2009 to settle Pension and Wage Revision issues in banking industry yielded no results and the proposed strike on 6th and 7th August is to take place. The UPA Government that sanctioned a pay hike of 40 percent in the pre-election period to Government employees who work for five days a week is reportedly confining to 13 percent hike in the case of bank employees who toil for six days. IBA has gone back from its offer of 17.5 percent pay hike reducing it to a mere 13 percent only. The MOU of 25th February, 2008 to settle the Pension Option within three months from then is breached and a roll back is seen. The oath the MPs and Ministers have taken upon the Constitution to render justice to people of all manners is breached while they are acting in a step motherly way towards bank employees whose work is directly linked to production and profitability while sanctioning huge pay hike to government staff who are not linked to profitability. It is strange why the government that meets the salary and pension bills of the teaching and non-teaching staff of the private owned educational institutions should refuse Pension to Public Sector Bank employees. Pay and allowances of Bank officials were standardized in 1979 by implementing Pillai Committee Recommendations to lower it to the level of Senior Government officials. The next three decades witnessed steep erosion in pay in banks which now bear no relation to the pay of Government officials. SBI employees are granted three benefits viz. Gratuity, CPF and Pension while the rest of the bank employees are discriminated by conferring Gratuity and CPF or Pension as retirement benefits. This is also a shame to the Democracy and to the Constitution that envisages treating identical people alike. Those in authority deceive the others by sanctioning all privileges in their own cases and despising others. Let us hope that wisdom shall prevail over the Finance Minister to take a befitting decision to do justice to Financial Sector employees without embracing the role of “Bhasmasura” in the case of bank employees and to avert the proposed strike.

C N Venugopalan
Ex-Manager UBI and Ex-Vice President, UBI Retired Officers’ Association, Kerala 919447747994 0484 2447994 ceeyenvee@gmail.com

Venugopalan feels the pain, it’s good to see that but in democracy banks also discriminates between rich/corporate customers’ interests and poor or normal class customers’ interests. It’s open in each bank employee’s behaviour, nobody can deny that, but then bank doesn’t respect equality in democracy. The pain matters when we get hurt but not when others get hurt.

Is it worth to blame the employer alone? What for trade unions function? Is it not their responsibility to protect the interests of the employees? Our so called leaders who do not do any bank work and spend the entire time on general matters can not know the cost of labour. They feel that it is because of the unions that the staff are paid. They feel that bank employees donot deserve better pay and attribute the compensation to the existence of Unions which is their case. This is what we call “jaundiced eye”