On Tuesday, Banking operations of india had been affected by bank strike. Around 4 lakh employees of the public sector banks were on strike. Some of the private and foreign banks were also on strike but for 1 day. The strike was to protest for the latest merger plan of government and the reduction in interest rates on the deposits of Banks.
In Maharashtra total 40,000 bank employees of 10,000 branches of different banks went on strike. This one day strike was called by two employee unions-All India Banks Employees Association (AIBEA) and Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI).
In the month of August, the government has declared the biggest amalgamation of banks of this year. With the motive to create fewer and stronger global sized banks. The plan was to merge 10 public sector banks into four 4 major branches.
“In this process (merger of 10 banks) the government is likely to close around 5,000 bank branches to enable small finance banks from the private sector to occupy the space and thus is privatise banking business,” AIBEA said.
The union said that the government is doing this merger with the sole concern of the benefitting the big businesses who have always looted the banks.
Union also said that government is mergering banks into one with the motive of reducing the number of banks but on the other side it is issuing new licenses to the private banks everyday.