The Hindu : Bank officers plan stir on May 2

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 30, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

Bank officers plan stir on May 2

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI April 29. The officer fraternity in the banking industry (excluding the new generation private sector banks) will go on a token strike on May 2 to press their demand that the Indian Banks' Association (IBA) should come out with "concrete and reasonable" proposals in response to the charter of demands submitted by the associations on which little progress has so far been made in bipartite negotiations.

The All India Bank Officers' Confederation (AIBOC), the largest officer-cadre union unaffiliated to any central trade union, as also the All India Bank Officers' Association (AIBOA) and the National Organisation of Bank Officers (NOBO) also want the IBA to take up with the Union Government issues such as taxation of perquisites.

Addressing a press conference here today, the general secretary of the AIBOC, Shantha Raju, alleged that the understanding reached in August last year for carrying forward negotiations for the five-year wage revision due from November 2002 had not been implemented by the IBA. In the six rounds of negotiations held since then, "management issues" were first taken up and agreement reached on one demand of the IBA, that officers should avail themselves of at least 10 days leave every year, since this had already been the demand of the associations themselves. The officer unions had, however, rejected the demand for reduction in the casual leave from 12 days to 10 days per year and clauses on consequences of appointment on the basis of fraudulent information, since this was an issue that the "law of the land" could deal with and lay outside the scope of industrial relations.

Mr. Raju said the officers had demanded a 35 per cent hike in wage outlay (in terms of percentage of total administrative expenditure), while the IBA was talking about a three to four per cent increase. Considering the increase in profits registered by banks in the past few years, the banks' plans to make public issues of capital besides the level of wage rise of around 13-17 per cent in the previous agreements, the associations wanted the IBA to put forth more reasonable and realistic proposals.

He said other issues yet to be resolved included the right to exercise a second option for pension in view of the changes in terms of the pension, lowering of interest rates for housing loans for officers (which, he claimed, were now more than that paid by the public), dealing with anomalies arising from the previous wage revision, grant of "late sitting allowance", appointments on compassionate grounds and rationalisation of leave fare concessions.

Mr. Raju said AIBOC and AIBOA would also participate in the all-India strike called on May 21 by all-India trade unions against the Government's economic policies, while the NOBO (affiliated to the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh) had opted out of that strike.

Leaders of AIBOA and NOBO questioned the double standards being meted out to public sector bank officials, treating them as government servants when it came to a question of vigilance and as non-government sector employees for purposes of tax on perquisites.

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