Aibea Flays Move On Employee-Directors
The All India Bank Employees' Association (Aibea) reacted strongly to the government proposal to remove employee directors from the public sector bank boards yesterday. The union regarded such a move as part of the government plan to privatise banks and said it would oppose all attempts at denationalisation and ill-advised steps by direct actions including strikes.
"This is part of the government's bigger gameplan to hand over nationalised banks to the private sector by reducing government equity to less than 51 per cent," Aibea general secretary Tarakeswar Chakraborti told Business Standard.
Appointment of employee directors is as per the Nationalisation Act, which would have to be amended. SBI Act would also have to be amended for removing employee directors from bank boards.
Such a possibility has arisen when bank unions have launched a campaign in the country for publication of defaulters' list, stringent legislative measures for speedy recovery of bad loans and removal of secrecy laws.
The government's aim is to restrict membership to government nominees and shareholder representatives from the public. The proposal is likely to come up before the Cabinet in the next few weeks.
A notification was also issued in the recent past by the government, which stated all directors including workmen and officers, whose tenure has been more than three years should be dropped from public sector bank boards. This would necessitate removal of a number of employee directors from bank boards, Chakraborti said.
Meanwhile, Aibea general secretary Tarakeswar Chakraborti said yesterday that the union is firm on its decision to go on strike on February 29, 2000 on finalisation of wage settlement for workmen.
The situation has been made difficult by some unions, who are demanding compensations to provident fund optees, who, in their opinion, shall have to bear the cost of pension. It was declared by them that they would not any settlement unless this is resolved.
"The rationale and consequential demand for compensation are unacceptable to Aibea because all employees in SBI and foreign banks are already enjoying three retirement benefits, such as PF, gratuity and pension. We are unable to understand how in this context any question can arise for compensation," he said.