 "An electrician puts lights on the logo of State Bank of India at its main branch in Mumbai")
Last week, the State Bank of India (SBI) started an intra-bank portal where employees could register their requests for transfers. On the first day itself, about 2,500 requests for transfers were placed.
The move was aimed at providing comfort to nearly 70,000 employees of five associate banks of SBI apprehensive of their future ahead of merger with the parent bank.
“We’ll take a call on how many requests we can accommodate. We are not promising any transfers. But, even if we can accommodate 500 of the 2,500 requests, it would make some employees happy,” says Neeraj Vyas, deputy managing director (associates & subsidiaries), SBI.
To take the employees of associate banks into confidence, SBI is also promoting frank conversations at its intra-network social networking site as well as face-to-face interactions with senior officials to clear staff’s doubts on merger.
Bank unions, too, have adopted a realistic stand towards the changing dynamics of the banking sector. “We have to change with the times. We need to re-strategise our activities and chalk out our priorities. There is a need to be pragmatic at times than being dogmatic. If the government is making some unilateral decisions, we need to know how to survive in the changed circumstances,” says C H Venkatachalam, secretary-general, All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA), which controls about 40 per cent of total strength of collective nine unions. In-principle, the union has opposed the merger of SBI with the subsidiaries.
Redefining the age-old management and union relationship, while unions are becoming more accommodative, banks are now more transparent in their dealings with the unions.
“More information is available to the bank staff and there is more transparency compared to earlier mergers. They are open to dialogue and coming on board. We are talking to the bank unions, trying to know their apprehensions, which is basically the fear of the unknown. The issues, which are clear to us, we are clarifying to them. We have not hidden anything from them,” says Vyas.
While SBI has clarified to employees that there won’t be any pay cuts or reduction in emoluments after the merger, on certain other issues, the bank has made its stance clear, even though it meant hard decisions. For example, at SBI, when probationary officers join, they get four increments extra on basic pay. This does not happen at associate banks. Bank unions wanted the same increment for employees coming from the associate banks as well.
“We have clarified that you won’t get the benefit just because the bank is getting merged. The unions have also realised that the merger cannot be avoided,” explains Vyas.
Notably, bank unions are no longer as strong a lobby as they used to be. They have faced a reduction in strength due to large-scale retirement of bank employees in the past few years. According to rough estimates, in the past few years, the strength of bank unions has come down by at least 10,000. At present, about one million employees of banks are members in unions. However, the number of active members would be much less.
Also, often there is lack of unanimity among the unions on major issues. “If there are nine unions, there would be divergent views. But, bank unions remain a strong body, as we successfully completed a series of tripartite agreement on wages,” says Rajen Nagar, president, AIBEA.
Bank unions are now trying to attract youngsters. “If 10 people are leaving, the fresh intake is six to seven people. We are giving positions of importance to young members,” says Venkatachalam.
Last month, when a government-owned bank decided to shut operations of a service branch in Kolkata, nearly 18 contractual workers were given a month’s notice to find a new job. Some of the workers have been in the job for more than a decade. Soon, the contractual workers’ association of the bank swung into action, which included a three-day sit-in protest at the branch premises. However, the protests had little impact on the management. A few days ago, the employees were conveyed that the decision to shut the branch was irreversible.
The old ways of striking work or marking protests do not seem to be working in favour of bank unions. Friendly negotiations, rather than aggressive posturing, seem to be the new survival mantra.
