Zonal strike to hit banking this week

The United Forum of Banking Unions (UFBU) will go ahead with its relay zonal strikes in various parts of India starting Tuesday to press for wage revision, a union leader said Monday.

"The deputy chief labour commissioner in Mumbai convened a meeting between the banking union and Indian Banks Association. The discussions ended in a stalemate. We shall continue with our planned agitation," V. Utagi, senior vice president of the All Indian Bank Employees Union, told IANS after the talks.

Accordingly, the entire banking industry in the south zone - comprising Karnataka, Kerala, Lakshadweep, Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana will be on strike Tuesday.

On Dec 3 (Wednesday), the strike will cover the northern zone of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

On Dec 4, the eastern zone of Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Sikkim, West Bengal, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and seven northeastern states shall go on strike.

The western zone comprising Maharashtra, Gujarat, Goa, and Daman and Diu shall strike work Dec 5.

Utagi said that though the strike was being implemented zonally, it will hit domestic and international operations, including clearance of millions of cheques, government transactions, forex, stock market transactions, money markets and other functions.

The last nationwide banking strike by UBFU covering 75,000 branches of 27 public sector banks as well as 25,000 branches of 18 private and eight foreign banks, took place Nov 12.

UFBU is an umbrella organisation of nine unions of bank employees and officers, including National Confederation of Bank Employees, Bank Employees Federation of India, Indian National Bank Employees Federation, Indian National Bank Officers' Congress, National Organisation of Bank Workers, All India Bank Officers Association and National Organisation of Bank Officers.