Hyderabad (Telangana) [India], March 16 (ANI): On the second day of their two-day national strike called by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), an umbrella body of nine bank unions, employees have said that their protest will continue until the government withdraws its proposed privatisation and disinvestment plan.

On the second day of their two-day national strike called by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), an umbrella body of nine bank unions, employees have said that their protest will continue until the government withdraws its proposed privatisation and disinvestment plan.

Speaking to ANI, Nallappa Reddy, a bank employee said, “If the government does not take back the decision of privatising PSU banks, then the protest would become even more intense and we will make sure that the government takes its decision back.”

“Against the decision taken by the Government of India to privatize PSU banks, nearly 10 lakh bank employees from across India have staged a protest is against this decision. The protest is in its second day as the call has been given for a two days protest, that is on 15th and 16th of March 2021,” he added.

The strike is called by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) against privatisation of Public Sector Banks and ‘retrograde banking reforms’.
Nallappa further said that the government is anti-farmers and anti-labor. “Since they came to power, they were only working over handing over the PSU of various fields to Corporate companies.”

Further PV Krishna Rao, a Central committee member of a bank employees union said that this protest is to oppose the privatization of PSU banks.
He said, “In order to cover up the budget deficit, the current government is privatising the PSU banks, which played a vital role in the economic development of this nation.”

The strike came after Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s Budget announcement where she announced the privatisation of two public sector banks (apart from IDBI Bank) as part of the government’s disinvestment drive to generate Rs 1.75 lakh crore.

Apart from bank unions, all the unions in four General Insurance Companies will be on strike on March 17. All the unions in LIC are on strike on March 18, while unions of four insurance companies have called for a strike against the privatisation of public companies. (ANI)