Mumbai, Oct 5: Bank unions have rejected lock, stock and barrel all proposals put forward by the working group on restructuring weak public sector banks, headed by former State Bank of India chairman MS Verma. The unions flagged-off their protests with demonstrations in Madras and Calcutta-- which houses three weak banks: Indian Bank, Uco and United Bank of India -- on Tuesday. The agitation programme is likely to lead to an indefinite bank strike."The Verma panel recommendations are politically motivated and even the timing of the submission of the report has political overtones," said All India Bank Officers' Confederation (Aiboc) general secretary SR Sengupta.
"The Verma panel has failed to take into account the role of employees have played in turning around these banks. It has spared the management and blamed the unions," All India Indian Banks Association president AK Jana told The Financial Express.
In their fight against the panel recommendations on VRS, wage freeze and across the board wage cut, the unions have put the raging issue of seventh bipartite settlement to the backseat. "Let us first fight it out on the Verma panel issues and wage pact can wait. We cannot accept job cut," said another union leader.
When contacted Verma said: "The report has nothing against the bank unions. It is a question of cutting 25 per cent jobs now or losing the entire 82,000 jobs a few years down the line since the three weak banks cannot survive at theer present form." Indian National Bank Officers' Congress leader KK Mair said the VRS is an outcome of large-scale computerisation, which is not beneficial for Indian banking industry. "The Verma panel has shifted the entire blame for the poor performance of these banks on the employees, whereas the high level of non-performing assets and the poor performance of the banks is actually because of poor management. The capacity of employees to sink a bank is minimal," Nair said.
Echoing the same sentiment Sengutpa of Aiboc said: "The panel has failed to diagnose the ailment of the industry. It is virtually silent on the role of corporates in making bank sick by in defaults and the weak legal system which makes it impossible to recover bad assets,"
In a letter submitted to the governor of the Reserve Bank of India, the All India Reserve Bank Employees Association said that the timing of the report is politically motivated and has expressed dismay over the recommendations. "Employees should not be held guilty for the palpable wrong doings of the top management and senior executives. The solution lies in weeding out thhhe root cause of corruption and nexus, not the curtailment of work force," AIRBEA general secretary, Samir Ghosh said.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.