Ahmedabad:

Banking operations in around 10 thousand branches of public sector banks across Gujarat including its commercial capital Ahmedabad and the major cities of Rajkot, Surat, Vadodara, Jamnagar, Bhavnagar and Junagadh have halted due to the two day strike call by the United Forum of Banks Unions (UFBU) protesting a meager pay hike of only 2%.

Employees of various banks including the SBI, BOI, Bank of Baroda, PNB, Central Bank of India etc took out rallies and protest marches. They also shouted slogans and organized sit-in protests across the state. An estimated transaction of over Rs 15000 crores, only in Gujarat, was likely to be hampered due to the strike.

The strike has been called following a failed negotiations between UFBU) and Indian Bank Association, Finance Ministry and Chief Labour Commissioner for bank employees’ wage revision. While the government and bank management have proposed a 2 per cent hike in wages for only a certain section of staff following high numbers of bad loans, Unions are demanding a 15 per cent rise in wage. Unions argue that it is not the operating expenditure but the provision of bad loans that is incurring losses as banks are making profit through operations. They say it does not justify nominal and selective rise in wages.

A bank employee of GM rank in the Central Bank of India said that the pay revision of only 2% that too after 5 years (due in November 2017 itself) was not acceptable.

A rally of bank employees was held here from Induchacha Garden near Nehrubridge Corner to Vallabh Sadan.

DeshGujarat