LUDHIANA: On a call given by
United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU),
bank employees of Ludhiana held a massive demonstration, opposing the offer of
Indian Banks Association (IBA) of 2% hike in salaries of employees.
Addressing bank employees, UFBU convenor Naresh Gaur said: “You are aware that in order to expedite wage revision settlement, we had submitted our charter of demands to the IBA in May 2017 with a request to negotiate and resolve the demands before November 2017. IBA representatives also assured us they would do everything to keep up with the deadline of November 2017, but even after 15 rounds of negotiations with UFBU, IBA — on one pretext or another — had been avoiding making any offer with regard to increase in wages. Discussions were held only on other service conditions, but IBA did not make any offer on wage revision. Therefore, we had to take the route of protests.”
According to Punjab Bank Employees Federation (PBEF) president Pawan Thakur: “IBA has given an offer of salary revision of bank employees by only 2%, which is really unfortunate and not acceptable to us. At this hour, we feel that wage revision demands of bank employees should be settled expeditiously, so that the entire workforce in banks can concentrate their time and energy in addressing the multiple challenges facing our banks, and to restore the confidence of people on our banks. But IBA’s approach in attempting to victimize bank employees and officers with merger wage revision which will only result in serious industrial unrest in banks, and dislocation of banking services.”
Others present on the occasion included, JP Kalra, president,
State Bank of India Officers Association (SBIOA); JS Mangat, deputy general secretary, SBIOA; Iqbal Singh Malhi, deputy general secretary, SBI Staff Association (SBISA); KK Khullar, regional secretary, SBISA; Gurmeet Singh and Chiranjeev Joshi from All India Bank Officers Association (AIBOA).
Representative Image