BANK-O-VOICE o voice March 2018.pdf · There have been Harshad Mehta Scam, Ketan Parekh Scam, and the NPA scam (not declared as scam by the Govt or RBI) due to misuse o f the loopholes

For Internal Circulation only

1

BANK-O-VOICE A monthly bulletin of SBIOA, Jaipur Circle March, 2018

SBI OFFICERS’ ASSOCIATION, JAIPUR CIRCLE

2 State Bank of India Officer’s Association, Jaipur Circle March,2018

Dear Friends,

Quarterly results : A shock wave

The quarterly results have made all of us to think, what went wrong for our Bank. Contrary to the statements made in the past that NPA problem is going to be over, it is spreading like a wild fire.

The recent announcement of RBI regarding restructure mechanisms withdrawal and forcing Banks to refer all substandard assets of 180 days to NCLT will increase the loan provisions from 15% to 50% which will be as high as Rs. 2 lakh crores. This is going to lead to a disaster. A major Crisis is emerging like a Tsunami after an earth quake. This may lead the country into a Financial Emergency and the results cannot be predicted. It‘s high time the RBI owns up its responsibility and reverses its directions. RBI tried with CDR, SDR, S4 AQR, PCA etc. and Govt. brought in IBC and NCLT but nothing has helped the Banks but all these are helping the Corporate Defaulters.

RBI is adding fuel to it instead of pumping water. Neither the RBI nor the Finance Ministry (Govt) have bothered to implement the recommendations of the Parliament Standing Committee on Finance, which submitted its report in Feb., 2016. Just transferring the outstanding loans to Power, Steel, Telecom and Infrastructure to Industrial Finance Corporation and converting them into long term loans will save the Banks of this blemish

.

A quick glance at our Bank‘s quarterly results will throw more light for course correction :

Corporate loan slippage 21,823 crores Power, Telecom, Oil & Gas, Iron & Steel,

Roads & EOC major contributors. Deposits + by only 1.86% Advances + by only 2.52%. Investment depreciation costs 4044 Cr. Net advances 18,55,581 Cr. Investments 11,59,169 Cr. Return on Investments gone down

substantially. Staff strength in 9 months gone down by

13708 Staff expenses have decreased 4.53%. Overheads gone up by 12.10%. The cross selling income have grown marginally from past. If we all would have spent the same energy for giving advances and recovering of NPAs, Bank would have made profit. Therefore, Bank should immediately review cross selling individual incentives issue by stopping personal incentives and transfer such incentives to commission account and also think for creating a separate vertical for such Cross Selling Businesses.

Banking is on trust. Let us try to win the trust of people. Speed up our campaign against FRDI bill; educate our colleagues to stop misselling and give fair and honest feedback. Officers‘ dignity is important.


Abuses in various meetings can‘t be tolerated. Finish the routine work on regular week days and not give a reason to Management. WE are regularly taking up the matter with management for proper Work Life Balance and stop Sunday/Holiday Calling.

Monetary compensation and Compensatory –off in lieu of working on Holidays is our right ask for it and lodge claims without any fear , nobody can deny and stop us from claiming the legitimate rights.

With warm regards,

Vinay Kumar Bhalla General Secretary

Stop The Blame Game Let RBI & Finance Ministry Own Responsibility

Much is talked and written about scams in the Banking sector after the Nirav Modi Scam in PNB. Why RBI, Finance Ministry, CVC and others wake up only when a major scam surfaces? Why we are not analysing the failure of the system? What is the role of the Govt and its policies which cause system failures and scams?

There have been Harshad Mehta Scam, Ketan Parekh Scam, and the NPA scam (not declared as scam by the Govt or RBI) due to misuse of the loopholes in the system. In this case, when a Buyer‘s Credit is available for importers why at all RBI introduce Letter of Undertaking which is not in vogue among foreign banks? What was the necessity for RBI to encourage imports by helping the borrower to get cheaper credit abroad instead of helping Indian Banks to increase them credits which would give better taxes for the country? It is a well known fact that the SWIFT has been used for frauds from the nineties and there are many reported hacks of SWIFT. Why RBI and the Govt did not intervene to correct the system? What happened to Supervision and Audit? Why RBI failed in supervision? Is it because RBI has been busy with other things like demonetisation? They are still counting the notes ever after a year! Has RBI lost its autonomy?

In what way the Chief Economic Advisor has improved the economy? He is talking about

Privatisation? Does he want to handover the Banks which have been looted by the Corporates to them so that they can loot more ?

We need better banking, better reporting, better supervision and better technology in aid of these. What we need is to ignore the cry to privatise PSBs, as if ownership uniquely determines ethics and efficiency. The popular chestnut is that PSB are structurally vulnerable to poor governance, resulting in the runup in NPAs. Data, yet again, militate against the hypothesis.

While there might be cases of fraudulent behaviour, they are not the overwhelming cause for the accretion of NPAs in PSB. Second, cases of governance breakdowns are not a monopoly of PSB — globally and in India, many privately-owned banks have been regularly identified with such errors of omission and commissions. Global regulatory fines on banks run into many billions of dollars every year. The Economic Survey 201617 studied the causes of the large NPA buildup in PSB. A very large part of it can be attributed to a growth induced credit bubble, followed by macroeconomic and regulatory issues that burst the bubble rudely. Corruption and malfeasance were not identified as a key variable.

In 2008, a raft of European and American banks, all privately owned, had to be bailed out by governments. The list of institutions bailed out included some of the best known brands in the business. The financial crisis of 200708 was the result not of public sector sloth and corruption but of private sector greed and poor regulation. Lehman Brothers went belly up, without any state ownership. Royal Bank of Scotland and Barclays avoided collapse by taking government equity. It is not ownership but the quality of regulation, reporting and management that determine banking efficiency. Closer home, privatelyowned Global Trust Bank and Bank of Rajasthan had to be rescued with state support. The reason for the above is quite simple — banking isn‘t the same as soaps, or steel, or hotels.

In India, the political economy circumscribes the quality of regulation and internal control policies at banks. It is important to appreciate this while fixing responsibility


for the bad loans and large frauds at public sector banks.

The TARP or Troubled Assets Reconstruction Program strategy of the US government to bail out US banks in 2008 cost approximately $800 billion. How much has the Government of India spent, over the years, on PSB bailouts? How does it compare with the rest of the world? Contrary to the popular narrative, Indian banks (predominantly PSB) have required very little bailouts over the years, compared to the rest of the world. Both in terms of direct fiscal costs as well as indirect costs to the economy, banking bailouts in India have been quite modest in terms of their impact. An IMF Working Paper on Systemic Banking Crisis, covering all banking and sovereign crises between 1970 and 2011 brings out the data starkly. The average fiscal cost of bank bailouts across the world was 6.8% of GDP between 1970 and 2011. For emerging economies, the cost was 10% of GDP. For India, in the same period, bank bailouts cost far less than 1% of GDP, a negligible amount. The current PSB recapitalisation plan announced by the government, amounting to Rs 2.11 lakh crore over two years, would account for less than 0.5% of current year GDP, and less than 0.25% annualised for two years. Further, India‘s bank bailouts have extracted far less cost out of the Indian economy than bank stress situations elsewhere.

Despite a sticky systemic NPA issue with PSB for five years, we have had no run on a bank, no stress in the money markets and limited impact on growth.

While there are many reasons for this, a big reason has been state ownership of the banking system. It has meant that bank liabilities have implicit sovereign guarantee, which maintained confidence of the markets in the banking system.

The country is struggling with mounting unemployment. The Banks have money but they are scared of lending. They are investing the funds in safe bonds where they are losing interest. Net result

is that the Economy is not growing. Employment is not increasing. What is needed is to have a relook at the policies. It is high time to redirect credit towards Agriculture, Horticulture, Food Processing, small and cottage industries which will increase employment. 11,643 borrowers in the country have availed 38% of the total loans given by Banking Sector as on March 2016. Just 12 NPA A/cs have an outstanding of Rs.2,50,000Cr. 84% of the NPAs belong to Corporates. Every year banks are writing off thousands of crores for this corporates which is the biggest scam. FICCI and Assocham should ask them members to be honest and repay the loans instead of demanding privatisation.

RBI is not willing to publish the list of NPA borrowers. The RBI is the one which introduced CDR, SDR, S4, AQR and PCA. None of them have helped the Banks but they have helped the Corporates to loot. With the revised norms the Banks will have to declare Rs.2 lakh crores more as NPAs and provide 50% provision for them. This is going to make all the Banks in the country to become red. This will lead to a financial crisis like the US crisis of 2008. The Govt may announce a Financial Emergency and handover Banks to the Corporates. This ill be a danger to Democracy itself.

What is needed is reversal of the Economic policies, credit policies and NPA norms and bring in transparency. Why accounts with security should be provided 100% provision for NPA in two years?

Why the present Govt has not appointed officer Directors and Employee Directors, in the boards of the Banks, which are mandated by law? They have scant regards for law itself.

Why Banks are forced into other activities like Aadhar Linkage, Aadhar enrolment, selling pension scheme of Govt, Cross Selling which often is misselling? These are major reasons for weakening supervision.

Why the MD of PNB was sent to Allahabad Bank and why another person was appointed as MD of Punjab National Bank? What is Mr. Vinod Rai doing in BBB? Rather than fixing accountability from the top why


18,000 transfer orders were issued in a hurry? The CVC guideline can be implemented in a phased manner. It could have been implemented after annual closing. Who is responsible for the mid academic disruptions to the education of children of the employees?

Why RBI is still hesitant to Publish List of Defaulters and allow them to run away from the country? Why the Prime Minister takes with him the businessman on foreign tours who are known for misuse of the system/Why the same set of businessmen get contracts abroad?

Why these businessmen are show cased abroad and why they are selected by the PMO & Finance Ministry instead of Industry Associations which was the practise earlier? Three important steps are needed immediately to save the banking sector and the economy.

One: Publish the names of defaulters of the Banks and ask banks to write to the home Ministry to make entry in the passports of the Board of Directors of these Companies ―Emigration Clearance Required‖ so that they don‘t run away like Vijay Mallaya, Jatin Mehta, Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi.

Two: Have a relook at the NPA norms. Why all accounts which have a default of 30 days be declared as NPA? Why not look at the reasons, scope for recovery, security etc?

Three: Appoint Officer Directors, Employee Directors and Nominee Directors immediately and allow them to play a watchdog role. Remove RBI Executives and Finance Ministry Officials from the Boards of Banks as they are Supervisors and they can‘t supervise themselves. It‘s time for a wakeup call. D.T. Franco General Secretary

PNB BANK SCAM The scale of the recent bank scams and the potential losses faced by banks holding non-performing loans given to some large companies and individuals, has shocked all of us. However, we are concerned to note that this has become an excuse to demand the privatisation of publicly held banks. While it is true that the current scam involves Punjab National Bank, the second largest public sector bank, the cause is very clearly inadequate and faulty regulation and monitoring of the banking sector. This affects all banks, regardless of ownership. But in a curious turn, fraud that was led by and benefited private players pursuing super-profits at any cost is being made the reason for handing control of the nation's savings to the private sector. Poorly regulated private banks are even more prone to scams and failure, as the financial sector is rife with information asymmetries and market imperfections. Private profit orientation generates incentives for managements to exploit loopholes in rules and engage in risky behaviour, as shown by US and European bank behaviour leading to the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-09. The bailouts they then require tend to be even more expensive for the public exchequer, because bank runs have to be prevented. It is worth noting that even a scam as large as the present one has not led to a widespread run on PNB and other banks. This is because of the state guarantee that still generates trust in the public banking system. In India, before the nationalisation of banks in 1969, there was an average of 45 private bank failures every year. This came down drastically after most of the sector came under public control. After the liberalizing reforms of the 1990s, the collapse of the private Global Trust Bank, Times Bank and Centurion Bank (among others) resulted in mergers, with the losses being borne by public sector banks. At present, several private banks also face large NPAs, often with the same companies that are defaulting on public banks. Some private banks have also been found guilty of providing unsecured loans and ever-greening of loans – both practices that PNB is now accused of. In fact, because of the opacity of banking practices, public banks are actually easier to regulate than private banks. As a first step to address the problem of NPAs, the Finance Minister should immediately require all banks to publish their lists of willful defaulters.


Public sector banks in India have played a critical role in financial inclusion, a project that is still far from complete. After nationalization, there was an increase in rural bank branches and accounts, and an increase in credit to sectors that were ignored earlier, such as agriculture and small-scale enterprises. Even now, private banks continue to avoid these activities and focus only on higher value borrowers and lenders, thereby excluding the poor. At this juncture, it is critical to focus on effective regulation and supervision of all banks, and to make the regulatory process stricter as well as more transparent and accountable. Using this crisis to privatise public banks will only make matters much worse. A QUICK LOOK: WHAT WENT WRONG IN THIS SCAM Many of our members may be curious to know the Modus operandi of the recent fraud committed by a businessman on the Bank. It is branded as the biggest fraud committed against the Indian PSB ever and it has happened during the time when we are all trying to bail out the ailing banking sector which further demoralizes the committed work force. System is attempting to point the needle of suspicion on a small time officer and we await to know truth as the normal prudence does not allow believing this allegation. The fraud has happened with connivance of PNB‘s staff working in the branch‘s forex department who is having access to the SWIFT package, with outsiders. The transactions were LOU/LOC based transactions, ie Letter of undertaking or Letter of comfort. LOU/LOC is a comfort letter issued by Indian Banker in favour of importer in India to avail Buyer‘s credit or loan from Banks abroad to pay the overseas exporter or supplier of goods. Import transactions generally involve following steps:

1. Importer in India approach Banks in India for issuance of FLC (with credit period/Usance or without credit period) to import certain goods. The FLC is sent to the Bank abroad through SWIFT messages.

2. Importer take delivery of goods from Customs authority in India, by giving acceptance to the FLC issuing Banks, to make payment on the due date of bills submitted by the Banks in abroad on behalf of the overseas exporter/supplier.

3. On due date of bills, the importer may approach the FLC issuing Indian Bank to arrange for buyer‘s credit or they can arrange buyer‘s credit from Banks in abroad to pay the import payment to the overseas supplier, to get more time to make payment to the bills against FLC since the funds are available from Banks abroad at cheaper rate in foreign currency.

4. LOC/LOU is one type of guarantee / undertaking messages to repay the buyer‘s credit extended by the bank abroad, on due date, even if the importer fails to make payment to us. It is commitment on the part of LOU/LOC issuing Bank. The message is sent through SWIFT.

5. Basing on our LOU/LOC, banks abroad will credit our NOSTRO account and in turn the amount can be used to clear the FLC outstanding. Further exposure to the Indian importer towards buyer‘s credit to be created in CBS system since our exposure to the Indian importer continues.

6. For the above transactions suitable credit limits to be fixed by appropriate authority.

In the PNB case the LOU/LOC was issued on behalf of the Indian importer without opening FLC with the Bank, ie in CBS system. Only undertaking messages (LOC/LOU) were sent to banks abroad through SWIFT by the PNB officials without any specific sanction for the same. In SWIFT system non financials messages can be sent without linking to CBS system of the Bank. Banks abroad extend Buyer‘s credit to the Banks in India (FLC opening Bank) based on LOU/LOC. In this case no FLC was opened. The proceeds of buyer‘s credit as gathered were misused to make payment to the imports or credit to their operative accounts. Regarding final utilization of funds no clear information was available in the public media. LOU/LOC can be rolled over by the issuing Bank at the request of the customer. As per RBI guidelines, Period of FLC and period of LOC/LOU, put together should not exceed the operating cycle of the activity or 360 days at the maximum. In this case it seems that the same has not been followed and roll over was permitted without following norms as well as furnishing fake import bill details to avoid detection by the bank abroad. All LOU/LOC issued without any base documents for import as per public media report. The FLC issued in CBS system automatically flows to SWIFT system. However, in the SWIFT, the messages can be modified or edited. Here the PNB staff has


reportedly done changes in SWIFT message by changing the amount etc while issuing FLC also as reported in the public media. UNDUE DELAY IN THE APPOINTMENT OF “OFFICER-DIRECTOR” POSITION VACANT FOR MORE THAN A YEAR TEXT OF AISBOF LETTER No.6056/11/18 DATE: 23.02.2018 Shri.Arun Jaitley, Hon‘ble Minister for Finance Government of India, NEW DELHI. Dear Sir,

The appointment of Officer Director on the Boards of Banks was introduced as a part of Participative Management empowering the representatives of the employees as officers to participate in the functioning of the Central Board of the Bank. It is a forum which provides an opportunity to the representative of the Officers working in the bank to share his professional experience and also convey the views of the entire fraternity of the Officers on all major issues concerning the bank apart from the role that the Officer-Director is entrusted to protect the interest of the officers working in the bank. 2. More importantly they play the critical role of raising questions within the Bank board on decisions that they find are not in the best interests of the Bank. The ‗Watch Dog‘ role, many a time‘s acts like a safety valve in sanction of high value corporate advances etc. The need for an Employee-Officer Director is all the more felt in the present day circumstances when the high value corporate loans are under scanner not only from the Regulators and the Government but also by the vigilant public, press and media. 3. We are constrained to convey our strong frustration and disappointment over the inordinate delay in the Appointment of Officer Director on the Central Board of State Bank of India in the vacancy caused due to the superannuation retirement of Com. Sameer Kumar Mukherjee, who retired from the Bank on 31.10.2015. 4. The process for the appointment of Officer Director on the Board of the Bank commenced well in time, even before the retirement of our former Director. On receipt of communication from the

Bank, the All India State Bank Offices‘ Federation submitted the names of the nominees vide its letter No.6056/36/16 dated 22.04.2016. 5. The Federation conveyed its recommendations in the order of priority and emphasized that Com.Ramkumar Sabhapathy, the Joint General Secretary of the Federation should be appointed on the Board as Officer-Director representing the officers‘ fraternity in the bank. The Federation submitted its recommendations well in advance so that there will be no vacuum in the position of the Officer-Director and the appointment would take place on time to ensure continuity of our representative on the Board of the Bank. 6. It is now almost two and a half years since the retirement of Com. Sameer Kumar Mukherjee from the bank on superannuation. However, to our dismay, the appointment did not take place despite our several communications to the Management and also our oral submission in all the bilateral meetings with the Management. 7. You are aware that in terms of the provisions of section 9(3)(f) of the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1970 / 1980, the Central Government has to nominate, after consulting RBI, one director from amongst the employees of the bank who are not workman, as Officer Employee Director on the Board of Directors of each of the Nationalised Banks. 8. We have been following up this issue with the Department of Financial Services, IBA and individual Bank Managements. However, there is no positive response noticed so far. 9. The Delay will only result in denying the opportunity of our members getting represented on the Board and participating in all the deliberations on behalf of our officers‘ community. 10. We therefore once again strongly urge upon you to kindly ensure that the Notification for the appointment of Com.Ramkumar Sabhapathy, the Joint General Secretary of the Federation is released without further delay. Please treat the matter as urgent. Thanking you, Yours faithfully, Sd/- (Y.SUDARSHAN) GENERAL SECRETARY


APPOINTMENT OF OFFICER DIRECTOR ON THE CENTRAL BOARD OF STATE BANK OF INDIA TEXT OF AISBOF LETTER No.6056/12/18 DATED 23RD FEBRUARY, 2018 SHRI.NARENDRA MODI, Hon‘ble Prime Minister of India, NEW DELHI. Respected Sir,

The All India State Bank Officers‘ Federation is the sole representative organization for the officers working in State Bank of India and its Associate Banks. It has been playing a positive role in discharge of its responsibilities to the country under the premier banking institution viz., State Bank of India. Its representatives on the Board of the Bank have been making positive contribution for the progress of the bank. The Bank Officers have been working tirelessly for smooth exchange of notes, opening of accounts, ATM Cash loading and recalibration etc., to ensure success of the Demonetization initiative of the Government. Earlier all the Bank employees and officers had ensured unprecedented success of the Jandhan yojana, all the Bima Yojana‘s, Mudra Scheme etc., and have played a major role in implementation of the plans and policies of the Bank and the Government whole heartedly. 2. More importantly they play the critical role of raising questions within the Bank board on decisions that they find are not in the best interests of the Bank. The ‗Watch Dog‘ role, many a time‘s acts like a safety valve in sanction of high value corporate advances etc. The need for an Employee-Officer Director is all the more felt in the present day circumstances when the high value corporate loans are under scanner not only from the Regulators and the Government but also by the vigilant public, press and media. 3. The position of the Officer Director on the Central Board of State Bank of India is vacant since a long time. Our Officer Director on the Central Board of the Bank retired from the Bank on superannuation during November, 2015. 4. The Federation submitted a panel to the Bank for the purpose of appointment of the Officer Director on the Board which was forwarded to the Ministry of Finance for consideration three years ago. However, the appointment is still pending and as a

result we are handicapped from our non-participation in the functioning of the Board of the Bank as a part of the participative management scheme. 5. We therefore request your intervention in the matter so that the appointment of the Officer Director on the Central Board of State Bank of India takes place at an early date. Thanking you, Yours faithfully, Sd/- (Y SUDARSHAN) GENERAL SECRETARY

RBI PENALTY ON ACCOUNT OF DEMONETISATION

DEBITED TO OFFICERS ACCOUNTS

DIRECTLY/RECOVERED FROM OFFICERS

TEXT OF AISBOF CIRCULAR NO.14 DATE 14/2/18

To,

The Deputy Managing Director & CDO, State Bank of India, Corporate Centre, Madame Cama Road, MUMBAI - 400 021.

Dear Sir,

Please refer to our letter No. 6180/94/17 dated

28.12.2017, the CNC Agenda of 30th October, 2017

and the various discussions we had on the above

subject. We had informed that despite instructions

from the Corporate Centre many circles are

debiting/have debited the RBI penalty to the

individual accounts of officers on account of fake

notes, shortages, delayed remittances etc., processed

during demonetization period.

2. The officers had handled demonetization in

good faith and with utmost care amidst all pressures

and constraints. Now we understand that certain

circles are filing FIR‘s also apart from recovery of the

amount, due to pressure from RBI. Filing of FIR‘s

leads to unnecessary arrests and harassment of such

innocent officers and will demotivate them from

undertaking any such initiative in future. We fail to

understand as to why the Circles are acting with so

much of a hurry and inhuman manner without

understanding the ground realities.


3. We are herewith attaching the Circle wise

consolidated list of penalties imposed on account of

Demonetisation for your perusal and necessary

action. Recovery from individual officers is unfair and

will send a wrong signal among the officer‘s

community.

4. Please advise the Circles to refrain from such

hasty actions which will only undermine the faith of

the officers in the system.

Thanking you,

Sd/-

(Y SUDARSHAN)

GENERAL SECRETARY

Y

DELAYING TACTICS OF IBA NEGOTIATIONS ON SALARY REVISION IN

SNAIL PACE UFBU TO DECIDE ON STRONGER ACTION

TEXT OF AISBOF CIRCULAR NO.12 DATED

03.02.2018

Our members are eagerly awaiting, all over the country, for an early settlement of 11th Bipartite Agreement, due to the fact that the IBA and the Government raised the hopes and confidence of the workforce that they are serious in completing the negotiations on the Charter of Demands in good time. The last bipartite term ended on 31st October 2017, and since then there was no serious attempts on the part of the IBA to take forward the negotiations in a meaningful manner. 2. On the part of the Federation and Confederation we pursued the issue in all seriousness. We had submitted a comprehensive Charter of Demands signed by all the 4 Officers‘ organizations in good time. We also appreciated the statements made by the Chairman of IBA that they are very serious and would like to complete the entire process of negotiations on the Charter of Demands submitted by the 9 unions and would complete in a systematic way within the time frame to ensure that the 11th Bipartite settlement is implemented at an early date. 3. The IBA took a position during the initial rounds of discussions that they would take up the residual and the non-monetary issues before they take up the issues related to the salary revision. The organizations appreciated their sincerity and were

confident that the pace of negotiations would be speeded up. 4. The IBA set up two sub-committees on the pretext that the full committee may not be able to meet at frequent intervals and the sub-committees would concentrate on the nitty-gritty issues of the salary revision and place their recommendations for the consideration of the larger committee. The committees which have limited power were not able to address some of the serious issues which cropped up in course of negotiations. In respect of the left over issues of the last negotiations known as residual issues which consists of the superannuation benefits as well, the IBA has just expressed their wishful thinking but was not in a position to take the issues to logical end. The issue of 100% D.A. neutralization the response was that the matter is in the Court and we may wait for a positive judgment. The issue of improvement of family pension, improvement of the pension etc., no positive indication of an early solution was forthcoming. The entire burden was passed on to the Government, thus creating a confusing status in our Negotiations. 5. The IBA also showed interest in improving and framing uniform guidelines in the area of Disciplinary Proceedings in the bank. A few rounds of discussions have been held. 6. The Public pronouncements of the Governments at periodical intervals appreciating the role of the workforce in the banking industry, in particular in handling the de-monetization, the implementation of Jan Dhan and other schemes also created a lot of hopes and aspirations amongst the rank and file in the banking industry that the Government is serious about the conclusion of the salary revision for bank employees at an early date. The Government came forward with recapitalization of the banks and wanted the banks to clean up the balance sheets. 7. Yet another major issue is the question of ‗Mandate‘ namely negotiations on all the 7 scales by the Officers‘ organization with IBA. Unfortunately, some of the banks raised the issue of truncated mandate once again thus creating a serious bottleneck in our approach towards negotiations. Some of the bigger banks have not given mandate for the discussions of all the scales and they intend to introduce ‗cost to company concept‘ at higher scales in the industry. This has led to a chaotic condition. The Confederation has been serving the entire officers‘ fraternity without any discrimination. Any deviation from this approach is bound to have strong


repercussions amongst the rank and file all over the country. 8. The issue was debated at length in the Executive Committee meeting of the Confederation and there was strong resistance to the moves of the IBA for segregating Officers into two categories for the purpose of Salary Negotiations at the industry level. 9. The IBA is yet to come out with a concrete proposal on all the issues raised above. The Confederation has urged upon the UFBU to take up the issue seriously and take such decisions which will compel the IBA to come to the negotiating table rather delaying tactics. 10. Comrades, the Federation has been championing the cause of the entire Officers‘ fraternity in the State Bank of India. We have not allowed any attempt in dividing the Officers‘ on the basis of the scales and grades in the Bank. We have membership including the senior executives of the bank and they have been supporting the Federation ever since its establishment and have been part of our struggles throughout. Hence, there is no case for us subscribe to the suggestions of the IBA for truncated negotiations. We will be enforcing the settlement on all the scales and grades in order to take care of their interests in the Bank. Hence, we have sought immediate intervention of the UFBU in the matter. We are happy to inform all our members that the UFBU will be meeting on 6th February 2018 and will take necessary organizational stand to speed up the negotiations and take care of all the ill-advised moves of the IBA in the matter.

11. We appeal to all our members to wait and watch for further developments in this regard. With warm greetings, Sd/- (Y.SUDARSHAN) GENERAL SECRETARY

8th March

WOMEN EMPOWERMENT WHAT IS WOMEN EMPOWERMENT?

Women empowerment means emancipation of women from the vicious grips of social, economical, political, caste and gender-based discrimination. It means granting women the freedom to make life

choices. Women empowerment does not mean ‗deifying women‘ rather it means replacing patriarchy with parity. In this regard, there are various facets of women empowerment, such as given hereunder:— Human Rights or Individual Rights: A woman is a being with senses, imagination and thoughts; she should be able to express them freely. Individual empowerment means to have the self-confidence to articulate and assert the power to negotiate and decide. Social Women Empowerment: A critical aspect of social empowerment of women is the promotion of gender equality. Gender equality implies a society in which women and men enjoy the same opportunities, outcomes, rights and obligations in all spheres of life. Educational Women Empowerment: It means empowering women with the knowledge, skills, and self-confidence necessary to participate fully in the development process. It means making women aware of their rights and developing a confidence to claim them. Economic and occupational empowerment: It implies a better quality of material life through sustainable livelihoods owned and managed by women. It means reducing their financial dependence on their male counterparts by making them significant part of the human resource. Legal Women Empowerment: It suggests the provision of an effective legal structure which is supportive of women empowerment. It means addressing the gaps between what the law prescribes and what actually occurs. Political Women Empowerment: It means the existence of a political system favoring the participation in and control by the women of the political decision-making process and in governance. The position of Women in India: The position enjoyed by women in the Rig- Vedic period deteriorated in the later Vedic civilization. Women were denied the right to education and widow remarriage. They were denied the right to inheritance and ownership of property. Many social evils like child marriage and dowry system surfaced and started to engulf women. During Gupta period, the status of women immensely deteriorated. Dowry


became an institution and Sati Pratha became prominent. During the British Raj, many social reformers such as Raja Rammohun Roy, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, and Jyotirao Phule started agitations for the empowerment of women. Their efforts led to the abolition of Sati and formulation of the Widow Remarriage Act. Later, stalwarts like Mahatma Gandhi and Pt. Nehru advocated women rights. As a result of their concentrated efforts, the status of women in social, economic and political life began to elevate in the Indian society. Current Scenario on Women Empowerment -.Based on the ideas championed by our founding fathers for women empowerment, many social, economic and political provisions were incorporated in the Indian Constitution. Women in India now participate in areas such as education, sports, politics, media, art and culture, service sector and science and technology. But due to the deep- rooted patriarchal mentality in the Indian society, women are still victimized, humiliated, tortured and exploited. Even after almost seven decades of Independence, women are still subjected to discrimination in the social, economic and educational field. Major landmark steps taken for women empowerment.- Provisions made under the Constitution of India such as: Right to equality under Article 14 of the Indian Constitution guarantees to all Indian women equality before law; Equal pay for equal work under Article 39(d), guards the economic rights of women by guaranteeing equal pay for equal work; and Maternity Relief under Article 42, allows provisions to be made by the state for securing just and humane condition of work and maternity relief for women. Acts like the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, prohibits the request, payment or acceptance of a dowry. Asking or giving dowry can be punished by imprisonment as well as fine; Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, provides for a more effective protection of the rights of women who are victims of domestic violence. A breach of this Act is punishable with both fine and imprisonment; Sexual Harassment of Women at Work Place (Prevention, Prohibition, and Redressal) Act, 2013, helps to create a conducive environment at the workplace for women where they are not subjected to any sort of sexual harassment. Panchayati Raj Institutions As per the 73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, all the local elected bodies reserve one-third of their seats for women. Such a provision was made to increase the effective participation of women in politics.

Women‘s Reservation Bill: It is a pending Bill in India which proposes to reserve 33% of all seats in the Lok Sabha and in all State Legislative Assemblies for women. If passed, this Bill will give a significant boost to the position of women in politics. Various Government Policies and Schemes-. The Government of India is running various welfare schemes and policies, both at State and Central levels for the empowerment of woman. Some of the major programs and measures include Swadhar (1995), Swayam Siddha (2001), Support to Training and Employment Programme for Women (STEP-2003), Sabla Scheme (2010), National Mission for Empowerment of Women (2010) etc. All such policies and programs focus on social, economic and educational empowerment of women across various age groups.Thus, there has been no dearth of social, economic, political, legal and Constitutional efforts made for the empowerment of women both prior to and post-Independence. However, women in India continue to face atrocities such as rape, dowry killings, acid attacks, human trafficking, etc. According to a global poll conducted by Reuters, India is the ―fourth most dangerous country in the world for women‖. Women Empowerment — Challenges Perspective: The most widespread and dehumanizing discriminations against women are on the basis of the biased perspective. The discrimination against the girl child begins from the birth itself. Boys are preferred over girls; hence, female infanticide is a common practice in India. The ordeal that an Indian girl faces at birth is only the beginning of a lifelong struggle to be seen and heard. Patriarchate Bottlenecks: The traditional Indian society is a patriarchal society ruled by the diktats of self-proclaimed caste lords who are the guardians of archaic and unjust traditions. They put the burden of traditions, culture, and honor on the shoulders of women and mark their growth. The incidences of ―honor killing‖ reveal the distorted social fiber in the male-dominated society. Economic Backwardness: Women constitute only 29% of the workforce but forms majority of the destitute in the country. There has been a failure in transforming the available women base into human resource. This, in turn, has hampered not only the


economic development of women but also of the country‘ as a whole. Implementation Gaps Through all these years, the attention is only on developing and devising new schemes, policies and programmes and have paid less attention to the proper monitoring system and implementation short-sightedness, for e.g. despite the presence of the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Technologies Act and various health programmes like Janani Suraksha Yojana and National Rural Health Mission (NHRM), our country has a skewed sex ratio and a high Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR).Loopholes in the legal structure Although there are a number of laws to protect women against all sorts of violence yet there has been the significant increase in the episodes of rapes, extortions, acid, attacks etc. This is due to delay in legal procedures and the presence of several loopholes in the functioning of a judicial system. Lack of Political Will: The still- pending Women‘s Reservation Bill underscores the lack of political will to empower women politically. The male dominance prevails in the politics of India and women are forced to remain mute spectators. Way ahead starts with bridging the deep-rooted biases through sustained reconditioning. It is only possible by promoting the idea of gender equality and uprooting social ideology of male child preferability. This concept of equality should be first developed in each and every household and from there, it should be taken to the society. This can be achieved by running sustained awareness programs with the help of Nukkad Natak or dramas, radio, television, Internet, etc. across the country. Replacing ‗Patriarchy‘ with Parity: A strong patriarchate society with deep- rooted socio-cultural values continues to affect women‘s empowerment. The need of the hour is an egalitarian society, where there is no place for superiority. The Government should identify and eliminate such forces that work to keep alive the tradition of male dominance over its female counterpart by issuing inhumane and unlawful diktats. Education is the most important and indispensable tool for women empowerment. It makes women aware of their rights and responsibilities. Educational achievements of a woman can have ripple effects for the family and

across generations. Most of the girls drop out of schools due to the unavailability of separate toilets for them. The recently launched ‗Swachh Bharat Mission‘ focusing on improving sanitation facilities in schools and every rural household by 2019, can prove to be very significant in bringing down the rate of girls dropping out of school. Political Will: Women should have access to resources, rights, and entitlements. They should be given decision-making powers and due position in governance. Thus, the Women Reservation Bill should be passed as soon as possible to increase the effective participation of women in the politics of India. Bridging implementation gaps: Government or community-based bodies must be set up to monitor the programs devised for the welfare of the society. Due importance should be given for their proper implementation and their monitoring and evaluation through social audits. Justice delayed is justice denied. Efforts should be made to restructure the legal process to deliver fair and in- time justice to the victims of heinous crimes like rapes, acid attacks, sexual harassment, trafficking and domestic violence. The idea of fast-track courts, devised to impart speedy justice to the victims of `rapes and other crimes against women, is a good initiative taken by the judiciary and the Government of India. Empowering women socially, economically, educationally politically and legally is going to be a Herculean task. It is not going to be easy to change the culture of disregard for women which are so deep-rooted in Indian society. But it does not mean that it is implausible. Only revolutions bring changes in a day, but reforms take their time. This one, in particular, will take its time as well. The idea of women empowerment might sound hard by the yard, but by the inch, it is just a cinch. All we need is a concentrated effort focused in the right direction that would rest only with the liberation of women from all forms of evil.

TEXT OF LETTER ADDRESSED TO CIRCLE CGM ON VARIOUS HR ISSUES IN UDAIPUR MODULE

The Chief General Manager, State Bank of India, Local Head Office,, JAIPUR

No. / UM/1 / 2018


Date: 21.2.2018 Dear Sir,

VARIOUS HR RELATED ISSUES IN UDAIPUR MODULE

With the creation of Jaipur Circle all of us together are making strenuous efforts with committed work force to take our Circle to newer heights. To maintain the premier position of our bank in the State of Rajasthan in the present banking scenario will be no mean task and all of us have to continuously strive hard for this. These days the priorities of Banker‘s are changing with every Government initiative and the work load is increasing many folds and staff shortage remains the key factor. We are regularly advising our officer members to strictly follow the systems and procedure and to be more vigilant to face the myriad challenges of Banking Industry ahead of us. 2. We are thankful that CMC, CDO and HR Dept. at LHO is taking all required steps for improving and maintaining excellent IR which is clearly reflected and visible these days. 3. However, we could not avoid bringing to your kind notice that the position of IR is totally reverse in few of our Modules, which speaks a different story in regard to various HR related issues. Firstly, we draw your attention to Udaipur Module where least attention is given towards the HR issues or even we can say the issues are deliberately made to spoil the industrial relations in the Module, still our officer‘s are keeping their calm and not taking any steps which may adversely affect our Circle‘s name. We have assured our officer members posted in the module that things will improve over a period of time and give your best for growth of the business in the Module. However, we are sorry to say that no improvement has taken place in the Module even after lapse of 11 months since creation of new circle after merger. Officers who were called by the Bank to work on

a holiday since 1.4.2017 are not being paid the settled and agreed monetary compensation of Rs.1800/- per day and compensatory off. Our officer representatives are regularly in touch but nothing is happening. This you will certainly agree is not a good state of affair.

Stoppage of 4 in 1 is used as a tool to get the work done by building unnecessary pressure.

Casual Leave /Medical leave are regularly declined.

Staff strength parameters are set differently for e-ABs v/s SBI

Scale 3 Manager is working under Scale 2 BM at a branch

10 days mandatory leave not sanctioned Currency Chest Branches are running with 1

/ 2 officers No Module level Meeting with the

representative of SBIOA Jaipur Circle held since 1.4.2017

Staff matter‘s are kept pending for a long time and find least priority area for RBO/AO

There is total lack of motivation for the staff in module.

The language tone and tenor of RBO staff with Branches /officers is uncalled for.

TA/DA/LFC/Medical Bills etc., are unnecessarily kept pending for unduly long period.

We are time and again assuring our members that there will be no discrimination with AB officers and all staff members will be treated equally, but in reality this is not visible at large.

Demonetization period Compensation as was discussed in the CNC is still pending.

4. The above are few examples of HR issue in Udaipur Module, similar is the case for some other module which we shall bring to your kind notice at appropriate time. 5. Sir, we assure you of our commitment to collectively take the Circle to its new heights in all spheres of the business, however, module management needs to be counseled regarding above issues immediately. 6. We solicit your kind and immediate intervention in resolving above issues to avoid vitiation in Industrial Relations in the Module. Please do the needful. With regards, Yours sincerely, Sd/- (VINAY KUMAR BHALLA) GENERAL SECRETARY

For Internal Circulation only

14

Published on behalf of State Bank of India Officer’s Association, Jaipur Circle by Ramavtar Sigh Jakhar – President and Vinay Kumar Bhalla-General Secretary

e-mail: [email protected] website: www.sbioajaipur.org

mailto:[email protected]

Documents

BANK-O-VOICE o voice March 2018.pdf · There have been Harshad Mehta Scam, Ketan Parekh Scam, and the NPA scam (not declared as scam by the Govt or RBI) due to misuse o f the loopholes