Pension is not a concession but right of staff: Madras HC

Pension is neither charity nor largesse to be claimed as a matter of concession. It is a right which is accrued to all employees of pensionable service, as they had toiled in employment for number of years of service. The minimum expectation of such employees in the twilight of their life is to be compensated modestly, the Madras High Court has observed.

“As French philosopher Albert Camus said, ‘It is a kind of spiritual snobbery that makes people think they can be happy without money’. The profound statement of the philosopher is more true and apt today as the world around us is rotating on a materialistic axis and every humble citizen becomes vulnerable and exposed to harsh realities of life. Life always revolves around hope and for pensioners adequate pension is the only hope left in their remaining part of life. Without that hope, the final phase of existence becomes too mundane. Therefore, the right to receive adequate pension is implicit within the framework of the Constitution, particularly in terms of Article 21 of the Constitution of India,” Justice V Parthiban said.
The judge was allowing a writ petition from ONGC Retired Employees’ Welfare Association and others on Tuesday.

The judge said that both employees of the exempted and unexempted establishments are entitled to the benefit of enhanced pension on the basis of their contribution with reference to actual salary received by them to their Provident Fund accounts. The cut-off date as prescribed, i.e. December 1, 2004, is invalid in law and therefore, the same is held to be illegal and invalid.  

The employees, namely, the writ petitioners, shall be permitted to exercise their option in terms of proviso to clause 11(3) of the Pension Scheme and while permitting so, the EPFO is at liberty to seek return of the higher provident fund contribution received by the respective employees with simple interest at the rate of six per cent per year from the date of receipt of PF amount and till the date of payment. The amounts to be refunded by the employees concerned shall be verified by the EPFO in consultation with the respective establishments in which the workers were employed. 

On refund of the verified amount with interest, the EPFO should calculate and grant enhanced pension on the basis of actual salaries received by the staff with arrears of pension from the date of their retirement and continue to pay monthly enhanced pension throughout their lifetime, the judge said.

The respective managements of the exempted establishments, which maintained the private trust, shall cooperate with the EPFO and render all assistance in quantifying the amount to be refunded by the respective employees with interest at six per cent per annum on such refund. The entire exercise shall be initiated and completed by the individual managements and the EPFO within six months, the judge said.

PSU Bank mergers are for privatization NO OTHER REASON

Banking mergers are not to save debt-ridden banks but to pave the way for privatisation eventually, it was pointed out at the Global Banking Trade Union convention, organised by the All India Bank Officers’ Confederation.

Because of the merger of banks, the volume of loans which were being made available in priority sectors and agri-small scale industrial sectors are coming down. The legal prospects of recovering loans taken by corporates from banks and which have become debts are very limited in India.

Some 15 years ago, the state of affairs in public sector banks in India and China were the same. Today four prominent Chinese banks have become front-runner banks in the world. Loan repayments conditions are strict in China. Public sector banking declined in India and ran into huge losses.

A seminar on banking mergers and protection of public sector banks was held as part of the convention on Monday.

Technology and innovations in banking sector, and Challenges faced by public sector banks in rural developments were some of the topics discussed.

Experts from the socio-economic sectors, and officers’ unions in various Indian banks are participating in the convention, which has been organised in association with Global Labour University.

IDBI Bank Officers’ Association to go on hunger strike on March 30

IDBI Bank on Tuesday said its all-India Officers’ Association will observe a one-day nationwide hunger strike on March 30, over various demands.

“The Bank is in receipt of notice of one-day nationwide hunger strike on March 30, 2019 from All India IDBI Officers’ Association (AIIDBIOA) addressed to MD & CEO, IDBI Bank in support of their various demands,” IDBI Bank said in a stock exchange filing.

The Officers’ Association has been protesting over RBI categorising IDBI Bank as a private sector lender with effect from January 21, 2019, pursuant to LIC acquiring 51 per cent controlling stake in the bank.

For December quarter of this fiscal, IDBI Bank reported widening of loss to Rs 4,185.48 crore as bad loans surged. The bank’s gross non-performing assets (NPAs) shot up to 29.67 per cent of gross advances as at December 31, 2018, against 24.72 per cent in the year-ago period.

*NOBO Condemns privatisation of IDBI BANK LTD.*

*NOBO Condemns privatisation of IDBI BANK LTD.*

The decision of Privatisation of IDBI Bank is highly deplorable and NOBO condemns it in strongest possible words.

We are against to very policy of Privatisation as it is not going to serve any good to the Country, Organisation or Individual. NOBO has a clear view that the decision for Privatisation of IDBI is taken in haste . We all are aware of repercussions of Privatisation ,no need to give specific example of working culture in private banks. Recent days newspapers are full of news which supports our earlier argument. Privatisation is no solution to any of the problem faced by the PSBs today. We oppose privatisation of PSBs in letter and spirit.

We are keeping our eyes wide open on intention of Government vis a vis privatisation. The recent step is very demoralising and frightening for the PSB employees. This will have a negative impact on their morale. This is very detrimental for customer Service also for implementation of flagship programme of Government.

It's spiralling effect will make situation more worse in Banking Sector and services to common mass will get hampered severely.
 We once again clear the dust ans reiterate that govt must not check our patience rather must move towards solving problems of PSBs and also strengthening it. Strong PSB is a prerequisite for Strong India.

Govt should save BSNL not Reliance Jio, says employees union

Nearly 1.98 lakh BSNL and MTNL employees would breathe easy on Friday as their unpaid salaries were taken up for clearance by the telecom PSUs, department of telecom officials said.A day earlier, about Rs 500 crore was released by the government in the wake of a salary crisis.

The payment of salary for the month of February 2019 got affected after the BSNL management took a decision in January to pay salary to all staffers depending on the revenue receipts of a telecom circle. Deficits in revenue collections occurred in circles of north and west India, where BSNL is on a back foot after strong inroads made by Reliance Jio in mobile data services.

BSNL employees in Kerala, however, did not have to face the delay in their salary payment. Kerala is among the most profitable circle of BSNL and has witnessed an increase in operating profit this year, before calculating depreciation of assets in its books.

Earlier, the telecom PSU had announced that it would pay salaries for March onwards on a regular basis. “There will be no more problems about salary payment as BSNL's own revenues would start to flow in from March onwards. I was told by them that Rs 850 crore is the amount earmarked for salary payment, of which Rs 322 crore will be used to clear past dues,” said Manoj Sinha, Union telecom minister on Friday.

“After this, there will be no more employee dues," Sinha told reporters. In fact, if everything goes as planned with BSNL’s cash flow, employees are likely to receive their March salaries on time by March 30.

The minister said that pending dues of Rs 171 crore of MTNL was also released by the Department of Telecom. Both BSNL and MTNL work on various projects of department of telecommunications and have dues running to about Rs 6,000 crore for BSNL and Rs 500 crore for MTNL, according to Sanchar Nigam Executive Union (SNEU), BSNL officers union.

“There are deliberate attempts by the government to stall BSNL's progress. This is also achieved by blocking our payments by DoT,” said Aftab Ahmed Khan, president, SNEA. Khan explained that BSNL’s receivables due from DoT are: Rs 2,350 crore on BWA spectrum refund interest, Rs 2,100 crore on excess pension contribution paid to DoT by BSNL from employee salaries and other receivables from DoT.

"This in turn will benefit the private operators especially Reliance Jio to capture the entire telecom market," he adds. During a meeting of the All Unions and Associations of BSNL (AUAB) with the BSNL management last week, the unions were assured that salaries would be paid by March 20. To improve sentiments, unions have interacted with each other individually and also with the BSNL management, which they claim hastened the due payment process.

BSNL officials said that the company had already received its letter of support from the DoT, which will enable it to ask for funds from banks to the tune of Rs 3,500 crore to aid it with a rollout of 4G data services.

The Modi administration had been going slow with tackling troubles that have been brewing with the employees of the national telecom operators. BSNL and MTNL employees have been protesting for a year over allocation of 4G spectrum to BSNL, revision of their pensions and seeking refunds from DoT on excess contribution charged from BSNL on account of GPF contributions for over two years.

Sinha and others in the government including outgoing telecom secretary Aruna Sundararajan had met representives of the All Employees Union of BSNL (AEUB) twice last year assuring them resolution of their demands.

After the last meeting in December 2018, unions were assured by Sinha that all their demands would be considered by the government, and stopped the unions from announcing a major strike.

But since his assurances, very little has come in terms of fulfilling those promises to BSNL employees. “We are now focusing our energy on convening a protest march on April 5, in which more than 10,000 employees of BSNL would march to Sanchar Bhavan and push for our pending demands. The excess payment of GPF contributions of employees alone stand at Rs 4,000 crore,” said Prahlad Rai, general secretary, AIBSNLEA.

At a time when all telecom companies are under heavy debts ranging from Rs 1 lakh crore to Rs 2 lakhs crore, BSNL’s net debt amounted to only Rs 13,000 crore. The telecom PSU is also assessed to have Rs 2 lakh crore of land and other assets.

Unions are now seeking government intervention comes to aid BSNL. Top management of Reliance Jio had earlier openly identified BSNL and not any other private telecom operator as their main competitor.

“When other private operators providing 4G services faced portability of numbers in millions, BSNL providing only 2G and 3G services did not have a single customers porting to Jio service. Government should rescue BSNL and not Reliance. They should allow us the letter of comfort essential to loan funds from the bank for network expansion and bettering other services and push for a revival package for BSNL,” said an office bearer of the left-backed BSNLEU, one of the largest unions of BSNL employees, without wanting to be named.

BSNL is an incipiently sick company (in net loss for 3 years) and seeks further equity infusion from the government. Earlier, an IIM-Ahmedabad study initiated by the government had proposed to revive the telecom PSU and termed it as essential to keep private telecom operators in check. Telecom users in India enjoy among the lowest data rates in the world while charges paid for spectrum by telcos in the country are among the highest.

In Supporting Demonetisation, RBI Behaved Like an Old Uncle Not Willing to Take a Stand very unfortunate for every indian

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has finally released the minutes of the 561st meeting of its Central Board of Directors held on November 8, 2016, at 5.30 PM. The minutes make for a very interesting reading. Let's take a look at this pointwise.

1) The meeting was held at 5.30 PM, just about two and a half hours before the prime minister Narendra Modi, announced to the nation that Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes were being demonetised.

What this tells us is that the RBI board met almost at the last moment and by the time PM Modi had already made his decision to go ahead and demonetise 86% of India's currency in circulation. The interesting thing is that the minutes are dated December 15, 2016, which is 38 days after demonetisation was announced.

2) The minutes of the meeting tell us that the RBI Board was informed of a steep rise in Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, by the government. Between 2011-12 and 2015-16, the number of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes had grown by 76.38% and 108.98%, respectively. This, despite the fact that the Indian economy had grown by 30% during the period.

This was used as evidence by the government to say that the high denomination notes were being used to accumulate black money, "since transactions made in cash do not leave any audit trail".

3) The core argument of the government, about the currency in circulation (or the number of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes) rising faster than economic growth, was basically wrong. And the RBI Board pointed this out to the government. It said, "the growth rate of economy mentioned is the real rate while the growth in currency in circulation is nominal".

This is the most interesting bit of the minutes that have been released. It tells us that the babus in the government do not know the difference between real growth and nominal growth. And that's very disturbing.

Let's get into this in a little more detail. The Indian GDP in 2011-12, in nominal terms, not adjusted for inflation, was Rs 87.36 lakh crore. By 2015-16, it had grown to Rs 137.72 lakh crore. This was an increase of around 58%.

In comparison, the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes went up by 76.38% and 108.98%, which sounds quite a lot. But here we are comparing just Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, but there are notes of other denominations as well.

The total value of notes of various denominations as of March 2012 had stood at Rs 10.53 lakh crore. By March 2016, this had jumped to Rs 16.42 lakh crore. This was a jump of around 56%.

Hence, the economy had grown by 58% and the value of notes of various denomination had grown by 56%. There was absolutely no problem on this front, and which is precisely what the RBI Board told the government.

4) The government also told RBI Board that "the incidence of counterfeiting is also on the rise in these two denominations [Rs 500 and Rs 1,000]." The government put the estimate of the total counterfeit currency in the country at Rs 400 crore.

As mentioned earlier, the value of the notes of various denominations, or the currency in circulation, in March 2016, had stood at Rs 16.42 lakh crore. By November 2016, before demonetisaiton happened, this had grown to Rs 17.97 lakh crore. Hence, Rs 400 crore of counterfeit money, worked out to around 0.02% of the currency in circulation.

As the RBI Board rightly put it, "Rs 400 crore as a percentage of total quantum of currency in circulation in the country is not very significant."

5) Also, the government told the RBI Board, "cash has always been a facilitator of black money, since transactions carried out in cash do not leave an audit trail". This is again a very fundamental mistake. While cash may be a facilitator of black transactions, a very small portion of black wealth is actually held in the form of cash. If the government had chosen to take a look at the data put out in the White Paper on Black Money published in May 2012, it wouldn't have made this mistake.

As per this report, cash, on an average, formed only 4.9% of the total unaccounted money admitted to in search and seizure operations (euphemism for income tax raids) carried out by the Income Tax Department. This data was for years between 2006-07 and 2011-12.

Not surprisingly, the RBI Board told the government that black money was primarily helped in the form of gold and real estate and "this move [DEMONETISATION] would not have a material impact on those assets."

6) After pointing out these negatives the RBI Board told the government: "The Board considered the memorandum and after detailed deliberations concluded that in larger public interest, the balance of the advantage would lie in withdrawal of legal tender status of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes currently in circulation."

After reading the minutes of the meeting and what the RBI Board had to say about it, it made me feel somewhat like this: When it came to the demonetisation question, the RBI behaved like an old uncle who made his nephew or niece aware of the negative repercussions of a stupid decision that he or she was about to make, but then in the end went on to say that, if that is what you want to do, who am I to oppose it. You have my full support.

7) The government would have gone ahead and done what it wanted to do irrespective of what the RBI had to say. But if the RBI had taken a slightly firmer stand it would have been in a better position in the days to come. Urjit Patel wouldn't have to quit as RBI Governor. And a post graduate in history wouldn't have been offered the position of the RBI Governor.

Now only if wishes were horses, beggars would ride!

vivek kaul's daairy   source

RBI categorises IDBI Bank as private sector BANK

The RBI, on Thursday, said that IDBI Bank has been categorised as a private sector bank for regulatory purposes with effect from January 21, 2019. This follows  Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) acquiring 51 per cent of the total paid-up equity share capital of the bank.

In April 2005, IDBI Bank was categorised under a new sub-group, ‘other public sector banks,’ by the RBI. 

The ‘other public sector banks’ categorisation, according to the RBI’s letter to IDBI Chairman on April 15, 2005, was “in view of the assurance to the Parliament given on December 8, 2004, by the Finance Minister during the discussion on the Repeal Bill, 2003, that the government holding in IDBI Ltd would always be above 51 per cent.”

Meanwhile, IDBI Bank said its board will meet on March 19, 2019, to consider the proposal for approval of rupee bond borrowing limit of ₹4,000 crore for FY20.

Narendra Modi’s MUDRA Yojana spells trouble for banks; bad loans jump 53%

Narendra Modi’s scheme of small loans for businesses has seen bad loans soaring in all the three segments — Shishu, Kishore and Tarun, while the total credit disbursements are lower, The Indian Express reported said citing RTI data.

Bad loans, or NPAs, under Mudra scheme in the first nine months of the current financial year 2018-19 have increased almost 53 per cent to Rs 14,930.98 crore from Rs 9,769.99 crore last year, according to the obtained under the RTI Act from the Micro Units Development and Refinance Agency (MUDRA).

The data also show an increase in number of NPA accounts under the scheme from 17.99 lakh on March 31, 2018 to 28.83 lakh as on December 31, 2018.

Meanwhile, in the financial year so far, total credit disbursement under the scheme was Rs 2.12 lakh crore during April-February. This compares with Rs 2.46 lakh crore disbursed in the previous full fiscal year 2017-18. The data show that the NPA ratio has risen this year. A rise in the number of NPA along with subdued credit disbursement implies that the ratio of gross NPA (NPAs divided by credit disbursed) which stood at 3.96 per cent in 2017-18 might have increased this year, said The Indian Express.

Micro Units Development & Refinance Agency Ltd. (MUDRA) launched in April 2015 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi provides loans to the non-corporate, non-farm sector income generating activities of micro and small enterprises whose credit needs are below Rs 10 lakh. The loans are disbursed by commercial Banks, regional rural banks, small finance banks, cooperative Banks, MFIs and NBFCs.

The increase in number of bad loan accounts during the nine months of the current year was 58.33 per cent, 70 per cent and 45 per cent under the Shishu, Kishore and Tarun respectively. The increase in value of the loans have been 64 per cent, 52 per cent and 42 per cent for Shishu, Kishore, Tarun respectively, reported The Indian Express.

Circular on Pension Updating for retired and existing bank employee

ALL INDIA UNION BANK RETIREES FEDERATION
(Affiliated to All India Bank Retirees Federation)
A/12, Girdhar Apt., Kastur Park, Shimpoli Road, Borivali (W), Mumbai 400 092
  Chairman     President                                   General Secretary
      D. A. Masdekar                                 B. G. Raithatha                                       R. K. Powar
        9970899393                                      9427207021                                          7710030963
damasdekar@gmail.com                   ubiretirees@gmail.com                        rkpowar@gmail.com

No. AIUBRF/163/2019  9th March 2019

To: All Office-bearers/CC members
& State Units of AIUBRF

Dear Friends,

Re:   Revision / Updation of Pension
Ref: Central government clears Revision / Updation of Pension to RBIs Retired employees

Members are aware that most Public Sector Bank employees are covered under Bank Employees Pension Regulations pronounced in 1995.

The Pension scheme came into being after protracted discussions and negotiations on improvements in service conditions of the employees held in 1990, during which the Indian Banks Association consented to introduce pension scheme in public sector banks.  The Pension Scheme was agreed with the Unions as a second retirement benefit in lieu of employers contribution to contributory provident fund.

It took almost three years for the employees/officers unions/associations to formulate the Scheme, though said to be the same as per Central Civil Services (CCS) and that of the RBI Pension Regulations. The Unions / Associations signed the historic settlement on Pension Scheme with IBA on 29th October 1993.

Individual Banks Pension Regulations were enacted in September 1995  in which an updation formula was introduced for the retired employees after 01/01/1986 fitting them into the Pay Structure which came into existence from 01/11/1987, and accordingly the eligible retired employees prior to 01/11/1987 had their Basic Pension updated. As the updation of pension was already introduced to the retired bank employees earlier, there is no justification whatsoever for the IBA or the government to deny updation thereafter to the retired public sector bank employees.

It is very important to note that while retired employees of RBI used to receive the Pension in line with central government employees, the Scheme was withdrawn by the Government in 2008. The Unions of retired employees of RBI had filed a plaint in Honble Bombay HC for Updation of pension; but the central government negated their demand on the grounds of huge expenses and contagious effect spreading to retired employees of public sector banks in future.

It should be understood that the benefit of pension revision / updating flows from the Rules to all who were eligible for pension and who survive; subsequent enhancement in pension needs to be effected following wage revision in salary.

It should also be noted that the terminal benefit load of central government pensions and periodical updation as recommended by the Pay Commission are borne by the exchequer, whereas RBI pension payment come from its Pension Corpus Fund, which has now been considered to be sufficient to absorb additional cost on account of revision of pension as cleared by the central government on 05/03/2019.

All the public sector banks have also formed Pension Fund Trust at their Head Offices and the total pension fund in PSBs stood at Rs. 2,49,121.97 crores as of 31/03/2018. Presently this figure would have exceeded Rs. 2,65,000/- crores.  We state that the voluminous balance of the pension fund is adequate to cover the upward revision of pension of the pensioners of public sector banks. The contention of the government and IBA that there are no funds to meet the rightful demands of the retired employees of public sector banks for revision / updation of pension is unjustified propaganda.

At this stage, it is very imperative to update you all with the financial position of the Pension Fund of Union Bank as of 31/03/2018 with comparative figures of March 2017 as under:
(Rs. In crores)
Item under Liability
2017
2018
Item under Assets
2017
2018
Item Under PL
2017
2018

Pension Fund
9679
11119
Investment
10714
11876
Interest earned
1369
936

Surplus
1353
933
Cash & Bank Bal
218
176
Exp
16
03


From the above table, it can be seen that our Bank made contribution of Rs. 742.38 crore to Pension Fund as per the actuaries calculations and as certified by the auditors. The Total Pension Paid in the year amounts to Rs. 659.09 crore. The Bank made surplus of Income over Expenditure to the tune of Rs. 933 crore.  The pension fund earns surplus that is equivalent to 142% of the pension paid during the year.  The total pensioners in our bank are 22094 within which the family pensioners number is 3936.  Thus it can be construed that our Bank can also absorb cost of revision / updation of pension.

The revision / updation of pension is the most important demand of the bank retired employees because there was no improvement in the Pension Rules over the last 25 years which has resulted in a situation where the retired employees of 2002 are getting very meagre pension amounts, as compared to the employees in the same scale of pay who retired in 2012. Thus senior retired employees who retired in earlier years are drawing fewer pensions compared to similar ranked retired employees of 2017.

It is being construed that the Pension is a welfare concept and not an earned right. The reality is Bank pensioners are struggling to meet their medical bills, and are treated negligibly in society as they attempt to live a dignified life. Therefore, the time has ripped to rise in one voice as retired bank employees to demand and secure the revision / updating of Pension, as has been permitted by the government for the Reserve Bank of India retired employees.

In the 5th National Conference of ALL INDIA BANK RETIREES FEDERATION (AIBRF), our Apex body, held at Delhi during 1  3 March 2019, Shri Sunil Mehta, the Chairman of Indian Banks Association and the Inaugurator of the Conference assured that IBA would consider retirees issues during the on-going wage negotiations. Shri. C. H. Venkakatachalam, General Secretary of AIBEA and other UFBU leaders who spoke, also expressed unqualified support to the pending issues of the retirees, stating that they were part of UFBU Charter of Demands.

AIBRF has resolved in the conference to take steps in coordination with CBPRO for improvements in family pension and revision / Updation of pension.

Friends, we firmly believe that the issues such as revision / updation of pension and improvement In Family Pension are of direct concern of the retired employees as well as to the serving employees as they move on and retire. And hence we appeal to all our retired members and colleagues to be ready for any struggle to fight for the right of revision/updation of Pension.

With regards,

 Yours comradely,

(R. K. Powar)
    General Secretary


_______________________

Views of Sri JN Shukla
TIME FOR BANK UNIONS
TO CHART A  COURSE CORRECTION

-Most Sought After Need!
----------------------------------------

I, tentatively, agree with the opinion of a very high positioned leader that there are many 'reasons' to present level of 'dissatisfaction' amongst employees. Atleast, his assertion show he admits the 'dissatisfaction', what I talked off in my write up 'Frustration is our own Creation' dated March 2 .

However, he categorized the 'reasons' as some  'self-inflicted', while others 'instigated'. There is no dispute, as satisfaction or dissatisfaction has the genesis of some 'contents' that may be self-thought of and ascertained or some from seeing, feeling, hearing something, someone & inspired thereof. In other words, dissatisfaction among bank employees has genuine contents, it doesn't matter whether that is self-inflicted or instigated.

Further, in his  opinion, 2 factors, that he held very 'important', to be borne in mind, perhap while suming up the present situation. One 'middle-class mindedness', that, according to him, 'is overtaking the class orientation base of bank employees'. The other, which seem to be hunting his mind, is 'unions are ill-matched for the consequent negative propaganda in social media'.

Social media is perceived to be dreadful threat to which Unions have no matching counter strategy.

Sometimes in past, I asserted that the Institution of Union is diluted with the emergence of 'self-styled' Unionism in every individual Bank employee, on social media platform. When the Institution of union is fragmented, disintegrated, dismantled and replaced by Unionism in every individual, it is difficult for Unions to face the emerging challenges and eventualities from their own rank & file. Here, Unions are ill-matched to negative propagandas.

So far 'middle-class mentality' is concerned, it is nothing new, as it existed across the world, what to say of our country. I found this grievance on account of 'middle-class mentality' being expressed by Tarakda on many occasions in his time. He called it 'typical'. However, with change of socio- economic orders, aspirations are bound to propel. Just we can't hush up it by terming as 'typical middle class mentality'.

A pragmatic view is necessary, as middle class has a right to get it's share in growth and surpluses. Bank employees have very genuine and legitimate right to aspire for comparative & better compensations, in view of their job profile, and this can't be viewed in such casual and callous manner. They must strive hard to secure better compensations and post retirement social security network. To be a middle class is not bane. It's most privileged class that contribute to nation building and create Wealth as well.

So far 'class orientation' is concerned, it needs to be understood in context of fact that people working in Banking sector, are different 'class' in themselves and they cant be equated with rest working fraternity. Their ideological moorings can't be tied to age old 'class' character or bases.

In Banking, AIBEA being the oldest and biggest operating Union has ideological orientation as a subject matter of individual. It never identified itself to any particular political moorings, rather moved as an apolitical entity on the strength of power it extracted from people coming from all section of society. It's first priority has been the safety of Banking Industry and second the well being of it's working fraternity. So far working class or other fraternity was concerned, it extended support & participation to movements and never shirked from its obligations. It helped AIBEA to remain in good stead.

According to him, these are the bottle necks. May it be true, but for Unions, these are not to be boggled at but to surmount.

Situations around 'middle- class' theorem have undergone tremendous change. Today, richers are not same, as they were decades ago and so is the middle-class. It calls for introspection and necessary course correction. Now, 'middle class mentality' doesn't appeal st all. It is taken as an insult.

There is huge perceptional gap between Unions & their followings. Further, the cross war among players adds fuel to fire. Some are trying to become savior by tall claims with implied purpose to make other villain. There is supremacy war by show down to others. Young bank employees & officers have no worth wisdom matching to these complexed developments. They swing in anger, anguish, disappointments, aspirations etc. Here, pragmatism fails agaist theatrical.

One is free to make tall claims, offer moon on palm. But, considerable point is whether is it possible by anyone to bring moon down on palm. As organization or its heads, a pragmatic view is panacia to all chaos. Unions have been busy in chaos so far. They must return to real agenda to catch hold management to cough up more. It will help to derive satisfaction and drive out dissention among Bank workforce. We saw Unions demanding 40% wage rise in past, but over period of time it invited wraths only. It didn't help such unions to grow. This criss-cross, dilly-dally must come to end. It will be unhelpful. If you don't like someone, best way is to say goodby, take honorable exit, maintain equi-distance. These are best ways. Best way is to perform of your choice, instead wasting your precious time & energies on such fissiparous tendencies. Most sought after need is: Bank Unions Must Chart A Course Correction to contain the brewing trouble across the workforce.

  
J. N. Shukla/Prayagraj
10/3/2019

PROJECTED DA for banker from May 2019

AICPI - IW (2001=100) for January, 2019 has increased by 6 points and touched 307, as against 301 in December, 2018.

Anticipated D.A. for the Quarter beginging May, 2019 is 64.10%, signifying an increase of 3%. (30 Slabs).

Nevertheless, it is to be noted this is only a provisional figure and actual quantum of increase will be known only after the AICPI-IW (2001=100) for February and March are officially out.