People's Democracy

Two- day Nation-wide Bank Strike Successful

C P Krishnan

TEN lakhs employees and officers of commercial banks - both public sector banks and private sector banks - and one lakh employees and officers of regional rural banks were on 48 hours strike from 6 am on February 10, 2014 to 6 am on February 12, 2014 demanding immediate and fair wage revision and opposing the so-called reforms of the banking industry.  The strike call was given by UFBU (United Forum of Bank Unions) an umbrella organisation consisting of five unions of employees and four unions of officers.  The strike was a stupendous success as all the 80,000 branches of commercial banks and 18,000 branches of regional rural banks remained closed on the both the days.  The strike call was observed by all – right from part-time sweepers to scale IV officers in hierarchy of the bank.

The wage revision of bank employees has fallen due from November 2012.  The common charter of demands was submitted well in time.  There were five rounds of negotiations between IBA (Indian Banks Association) representing the managements of 58 public and private sector banks on the one hand and UFBU on the other hand till November 2013 at the interval of every two months.  As there was no concrete offer even after one year, the bank employees and officers struck work for a day on December 18, 2013 to express their protest and anger over the inaction of IBA/central government in settling the wage revision reasonably. 

During the bipartite talks between IBA and UFBU on  January 27, 2014, IBA improved their offer by a meager 0.5% from 9.5% to 10% of pay slip component and thus insulted lakhs of bank employees and officers. Further IBA was stubborn in their counter demands which included termination of the service of an employee at the age of 55 years or after completion of 30 years of service whichever is earlier, free hand to transfer the employees anywhere in the state, introduction of variable pay depending upon ‘performance’ of the employee with a view to divide and rule the employees. All the reasonable arguments put forth by the leaders of UFBU went unheeded.

It is to be noted that during the last wage revision, there was an increase of 17.5% of the total wage bill of the employees and officers. In this background, the offer of IBA formed no basis for further talks. 

Therefore the leaders of the nine unions under the banner of UFBU were forced to give a call for 48 hours strike commencing from 6 am on February 10, 2014 and ending at 6 am on  February 12,  2014.

When the strike call was on February 10-11, the IBA deliberately fixed the date for bilateral negotiations on  February 13, 2014 after the strike dates.  .

At the intervention of CLC (chief labour commissioner), conciliation talks were held on February 6 at Delhi between IBA and UFBU.  CLC advised IBA to advance the date of the bilateral discussions and settle the demands of the unions amicably and simultaneously advised UFBU to call off the strike and come to negotiating table.  The union leaders said that they were ready to negotiate; further if there was an acceptable offer they were ready to review strike decision.   But IBA was not ready for bilateral talks.

Thus this strike was forced upon the bank employees and officers by the government and the IBA combine.

When the strike was observed on the first day on February 10, IBA unilaterally cancelled the bilateral negotiations slated for February 13, 2014 thus provoking the employees and the officers.  The finance minister P Chidambaram made a statement whether the entire profit could be given to the bank employees as wage increase. This again was not only incorrect statement but also misleading with a view to set the general public against the fighting bank staff.  The truth remains that the combined operating profit of the PSBs last year was more than Rs 1,20,000 crores and if the demands of the employees are considered it would not be more than 10% of the same.

The anger of the bank employees was expressed through massive demonstrations in nearly 800 centres throughout the country on both the days.

The bank strike was also to oppose the retrograde move of the government of India to privatise public sector banks and to give license to corporates to open new banks.  The RBI has come out recently with a paper advocating both, besides recommendations to privatise regional rural banks and co-operative banks. This move, if left unchecked will thoroughly change the direction of the banking industry from mass banking to class banking and set the time zone behind 45 years when private banks were in the hands of big corporates which proved to be detrimental to the interest of the common man. The Indian banking industry withstood the global crisis of 2008 largely due to the fact that overwhelming majority of the banking industry was under the control of public sector acknowledged by the RBI in its report.  Therefore the bank employees and officers rightfully opposed this move of the government to privatise public sector banks.

The success of the two days’ strike has sent a strong message to those at the helm of the affairs in the management of banks and the government of India that bank employees were determined to take the challenge through struggles.  If no positive approach is forthcoming from them in a few days, the UFBU which shall meet on February 19 at Mumbai shall be constrained to escalate the strike actions.