Nagpur : Following a meeting with the Union Finance Secretary Rajiv Kumar, bank unions have decided to call off the two-day bank strike that was planned for this week. In a statement, bank unions said in view of the consideration of the positive and workable solution by the finance secretary, the 48-hour-long strike from September 26-27 stands deferred.
The strike call by bank unions had threatened to shut the banking network for a consecutive four days as the next two days after the proposed strike were bank holidays.
5 things to know about the postponed bank strike:
1) The bank strike call would have not only affected transactions at bank branches but also badly affected ATMs. It was being feared that if banks are shut for four days, several ATMs would run dry by the weekend. But now banking activities would not be affected.
2) The bank unions have cautiously used the word “deferred” in their statement. It signals that they can again give another call for strike at a later date if their demands are not met.
3) The four unions that were part of the strike call, All India Bank Officers’ Confederation (AIBOC), All India Bank Officers’ Association (AIBOA), Indian National Bank Officers’ Congress (INBOC) and National Organisation of Bank Officers (NOBO), claimed to have support of about 4 lakh bank employees.
4) In the meeting with the finance secretary, the bank union leaders raised the issue of mergers, wage revision, introduction of full 5-day week, reduction of cash transaction hours, issues related to retired employees and also scrapping of third party products.
5) “Finance Secretary Rajiv Kumar was positive in formation of a committee consisting of all concerned to address the issues arising out of the proposed merger of 10 banks including preserving the identity of all the banks. An appeal was made to us to revisit our strike call in view of the discussions,” a joint statement by bank unions said.
