Public sector banks may go on strike on Tuesday: Here’s why it may be a good thing for customers

Public sector banks are preparing to go on a nationwide strike on Tuesday. While the strike may seem disruptive to customers, but their demands are surely in their favour. 

The United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), the umbrella body of nine bank staff unions, has decided to go strike on August 22 after ‘all attempts to hammer out solutions to the demands raised by the unions bore no fruit’. 

Among their top demands are making declaring willful default of loans as criminal offence and ban on practice wherein banks pass on the burden of corporate NPAs on bank customers by hiking charges.

 “As the conciliation meeting before the Chief Labour Commissioner failed, unions are left with no other option but to go on strike. There was no assurance from the government and the management of banks,” AIBOC General Secretary D T Franco said.

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Other demands include no write-off policy for non-performing assets (NPAs) of corporate loans and implementation of recommendations of Parliamentary Committee on recovery of NPAs, AIBEA General Secretary C H Venkatchalam said.

Venkatchalam said the government should abolish the Banks Board Bureau and ensure stringent measures to recover bad loans and accountability of top executives.

UFBU, which claims membership of nearly 10 lakh across banks, also requested the government for cost reimbursement of demonetisation to banks.

Most banks have already informed their customers that functioning of branches and offices will be impacted if the strike takes off.

Operations at private lenders like ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank are expected to be normal except delay in cheque clearances.

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