Staff stage protest against BoS merger with SBI

Employees of the State Bank of Hyderabad (SBH) and other State Bank of India (SBI) associate banks on Monday staged a protest at the SBH headquarters in Hyderabad against the move to merge the State Bank of Saurashtra (BoS) with SBI.

They contended that the merger of BoS was a prelude to the merger of the remaining associate banks with SBI. The mergers will result in reduction of the number of branches and removal of some of the employees.

According to the Associate Banks’ Officers’ Association SBH unit president Peri Subba Rao, BoS, which is in existence for 105 years, functions as an independent public sector bank and thrived on the brand equity that stemmed from the local feel and goodwill.

About 80,000 employees took part in the nationwide agitation on Monday. The associate banks have a combined network of 5,000 branches and a turnover of Rs 4 lakh crore. They accounted for 48 per cent of the total turnover of SBI.

Association general secretary Harsh Vardhan Madabhushi said public sector undertaking banks should be strengthened with more branches to face competition from private and foreign banks.

The merger will not aid in any commercial purpose as the resources of all the associate banks were already available for effective deployment by the SBI, which was bringing out the group balance sheet.

The mergers will allow the customers to migrate to other banks and will also affect the implementation of government-sponsored progra-mmes, he said.

Banking business was hit as the staff did not attend their duties.

Meanwhile, the SBH Staff Association, Hyderabad, has given a strike call on August 20 in support of the demands of the National Trade Union Convention and for abandoning privatisation and merger of public sector banks. The bank will not provide the full range of services due to strike to its customers, a release said.

The association, however, did not quantify the loss in transactions due to the strike. The association members have planned an indefinite strike in September if the merger efforts are not withdrawn.