Amidst protests by employees, State Bank of India (SBI) yesterday shifted the entire inter-bank dealing operations from its foreign department to Mumbai. The SBI management has thereby implemented its decision taken long back to integrate the foreign exchange treasury with the domestic treasury operations.
In fact, SBI started inter-bank dealing operations in Mumbai on September 7 while keeping the major part of the work in Calcutta. This gave the impression that the Mumbai office would only operate on a parallel level and only partially so far as the inter-bank operations were concerned.
However, the SBI management made its mind clear by issuing transfer order to three dealers at the Calcutta office on Friday. That clearly showed that the SBI foreign department would lose its vital inter-bank dealing operations, and the Mumbai domestic treasury would be the gainer.
Sensing trouble, SBI Staff Association (foreign department unit) leaders met Kailashpati Mishra, vice-president, Bharatiya Janata Part. Mishra, spoke to the secretary of the Union finance minister urging him to prevail upon the SBI management not to go in for a hurried shifting of operations.
Apart from the staff union, SBI Officers' Association has also been agitating against the management decision. Both the associations would call upon the state finance minister Asim Dasgupta today to discuss the issue. Calcutta Exchange Brokers Association and Exchange & Bullion Brokers Association, in a joint statement, said "the shift of the operations took place to please a certain section of vested interests."
