Millions Of Bank Employees Will Stop Working To Protest Privatisation; SBI Issues Alert For 45 Crore Customers

The two day nationwide bank strike on 16 and 17 December may affect the working of the State Bank of India (SBI).

Reportedly, the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) has called a strike to protest against the government’s move to privatize public sector banks.

SBI Branches, ATM Services May Get Affected On 2- Day Bank Strike 

During this 2 days strike, SBI branches, ATM services may be hit. 

Although, SBI has made all the arrangements to ensure normal functioning in its branches and offices, according to its statement. 

SBI said, “We have been advised by the lndian Banks’ Association (lBA) that United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) has served a Notice of Strike, informing that the members of the constituent Unions of UFBU viz. AIBEA, AIBOC, NCBE, AIBOA, BEFI, INBEF and INBOC propose to go on a nationwide Bank Strike on l6th & l7th December, 2021 in support of their demands. We advise that while the Bank has made necessary arrangements to ensure normal functioning in its branches and offices on the days of Strike, it is likely that work in our Bank may be impacted by the Strike” in an exchange filing on 10 December.

Why Would This Happen? 

On December 16, the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) called a two-day strike to protest against the Center’s plan to privatize public sector banks. 

Here, UFBU works as an umbrella organization of bank unions. 

Basically, this move to privatize PSBs will hurt the priority sectors of the economy and also credit flow to self-help groups and to the rural economy, according to Sanjay Das, general secretary of All India Bank Officers Confederation (AIBOC). 

Further,he mentioned that 70 percent of the country’s total deposits are with the public sector banks.

So, handing them over to private capital will put the common man’s money deposited with these banks into jeopardy, as per the report.

Earlier, the Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said that two public sector banks will be privatized during the current fiscal, during the budget speech of 2021.