Bank strike today; SBI may not be affected

Our Banking Bureau

Kolkata, Jan 3: Banking services throughout the country are likely to be severely affected Friday owing to a 24-hour bank strike called by All India Bank Employees’ Association (AIBEA).

However, AIBEA is not quite confident that the strike will be total owing to the absence of its representatives in the country’s biggest public sector bank, State Bank of India. The strike will not also affect the normal functioning of The Reserve Bank of India, since the employees’ and workers’ associations there are neither a party to the strike nor they are supporting the strike call.

RBI’s assistant general manager (personnel), A Mohanty, said the central bank would function normally Friday and the clearing operations will also be conducted according to schedule.

AIBEA general secretary Tarakeshwar Chakrabarty told The Financial Express, “we ourselves do not claim that the strike will be 100 per cent successful, specially in some rural areas.” However, he added, since the other unions had decided to morally support the strike, it would be successful whereever AIBEA is successful in assigning volunteers to block the gates.