Business worth ₹10k cr hit in state
Banks across Rajasthan remained closed as part of nationwide strike called by United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) on Tuesday.
UFBU convener Mahesh Mishra said the nationwide strike was to protest against the anti- people and labour banking policies of the Centre and Reserve Bank of India.
Bank employees and officials protested against the attack on the basic rights of working-class in the name of labour reforms, proposals of mergers and privatisation of banks, outsourcing bank work instated of paying compensation to employees and officers who did overtime during demonetisation, he said.
He further said that in Rajasthan, no banking transaction took place in more than 5,000 branches and people too faced problems as many ATMs ran out of cash.
“People who have taken loans of more than Rs 13 lakh crore from different corporate banks are not repaying the loans as a result of which banks have to face loss and shortage of capital,” he said. “This is one of the reasons that the government wants to merge and privatise banks, but is not making any concrete plan to collect the bad loans.”
Mishra further said that imposing burden on customers is levying a number of charges, which we condemn.
“The State Bank of India in the last quarter collected more than ₹ 235 crore from customers who did not maintain a minimum balance, which is looting customers to provide relief to people who did not repay their loans, which we protest”.
The strike was successful and business worth ₹10,000 crore was affected in Rajasthan, he said.
The employees and officials of different banks gathered at the Allahabad Bank zonal office at 11am and protested shouting slogans against the government policies.
Bank employees union leaders while addressing the gathering, said if the government does not take the issues seriously then they will go on a two-day strike in October or November and on September 15 will gather in front of Parliament.