The upshot is that the bank management will now be well-equipped to ensure that maximum productivity is gained from employees. As a quid pro quo, the management has promised assured career progression for its employees. The union feels that in order to maintain the competitive edge of the bank, the bank has to ensure quality of service and upgradation of systems and technology.

It has therefore agreed to ATMs, note-counting machines et al, and the staff will have no objection to seven-day banking at fully computerised branches, staggered working hours, and working in shifts. These might merely seem routine adjustments to the need of the times. Butthat view does not take into account the history of militant trade unionism in the banking sector.

To be sure, SBI has been better off than other banks so far as industrial relations are concerned. There is also the risk that well-intentioned pacts reached at the apex level are watered down once they reach branch level.

Balancing the books, for example, was always supposed to be part of normal day-to-day work, but in practice it is the officers who do the job in many branches. But at least a beginning has been made, and the bank's management will have greater freedom to ensure performance. Bank unions have seen the writing on the wall, and the SBI agreement could serve as a model for others to follow.