Lucknow, December 17: Due to the bank strike of two days, about 3000 crore transactions were affected in Lucknow and 40 thousand crores in the state. ATMs also became cashless at many places in the state resulting in people faced lot of problems.
On both the days of the strike, 10 thousand bank employees of 905 branches of nationalized banks in Lucknow district and 2 lakh bank employees of 14 thousand branches of the state were participated. Around 990 in Lucknow and 12 thousand ATMs in the state ran out of money. People could not withdraw their money due to running out of cash in many of the machines and ATMs were faulty and closed.
Apart from this, online banking also kept people crying throughout the day due to network problem. Due to the strike, the pensioners, the salaried and the general public had to face problems. Deposits and withdrawals in branches, FD renewal, loan related work, government treasury and business related work were affected heavily.
On the call of United Forum of Bank Unions, the nationwide strike of bank workers continued for the second day today as part of the Central government’s conspiracy to sell public sector banks by privatization. Due to the strike, the branches and offices of all the public sector banks remained shut down.
Addressing the gathering at the Indian Bank Hazratganj on the second day of the bank strike, Pawan Kumar, National Senior Vice President of All India Bank Officers Confederation (AIBOC) said, “The capitalists and politicians have an eye on the public money deposited in the banks. But the government will sanction big loans to them, then after making the loan NPA, the borrower will settle the loan by paying only 10 or 15 percent amount or will leave the country, Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, Chanda Kochhar etc. are direct examples.
NCBE State General Secretary Akhilesh Mohan said that despite the retirement of senior employees, due to non-recruitment of sufficient number of new employees, the workload per employee is increasing, on the other hand the government has merged banks arbitrarily, now We have made preparations to sell banks by privatization, we will not allow this to happen at all.
In the demonstration, Deep Bajpai, State Vice President of UP Bank Employees Union appealed to the general public to join us in raising voice against the sale of nationalized banks by the government, lakhs of small depositors, farmers, small and medium industries of these banks, themselves Political parties and labor organizations along with aid groups and small borrowers are requested to join our movement so that the hard earned money of the people can be stopped from being wasted.
RN Shukla of the Indian Bank Officers’ Association said that bank privatization would weaken the security of bank deposits, with the public sector holding nearly 70 percent of the depositor’s total savings of Rs.87.6 lakh crore in India.
Forum’s state convener YK Aroda said- “Privatization of public sector is an unfavourable step for the economy, privatization of banks is part of the government’s strategic disinvestment, under which the government will sell a share of about 5.30 lakh crores in the name of economic liberalization.” It’s over We oppose these malicious actions and efforts of the government.
District coordinator Anil Srivastava said that the government wants to take away the common banking facilities of the common man by privatizing the banks. If the government does not accept our demand, then we are ready for a long struggle.
