Business & Finance
Public Sector Bank Employees Strike Nationwide Over Five-Day Workweek Demand
By Akriti Anand
Public sector banking operations across India were disrupted on Friday, September 11, as the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) staged a nationwide strike. Private banks continued normal operations, but many public sector bank branches shut down completely or partially as employees and officers joined the protest.
The UFBU, which represents seven unions covering roughly 90% of bank officers and employees, organized the walkout. CH Venkatachalam, general secretary of the All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA), estimated that nearly 800,000 employees, officers, and managers took part.
This one-day strike is the first in a planned series of escalating actions. The unions have scheduled a three-day strike for September 28-30, and warned that an indefinite nationwide strike would begin October 26 if their demands remain unmet.
The UFBU outlined four primary demands: implementation of a five-day banking week with all Saturdays as holidays; withdrawal of the government's performance-linked incentive (PLI) scheme; a non-discriminatory incentive structure developed through bilateral negotiations; and resolution of outstanding issues, including those related to pensions.
According to Venkatachalam, the central demand involves government approval of a five-day banking week, which was reportedly agreed upon in the 12th Bipartite Settlement signed with the Indian Banks' Association (IBA) in March 2024. This agreement, however, still awaits official government notification.
The All India Bank Officers' Confederation (AIBOC) noted on September 9 that two rounds of online discussions had taken place without reaching a resolution on the five-day workweek issue. Separately, the UFBU stated on September 8 that during a conciliation meeting, the IBA and the Department of Financial Services (DFS) indicated that the government's PLI scheme had been put on hold and would be discussed with unions. However, no progress was made regarding the five-day workweek proposal, prompting the unions to proceed with the strike. A follow-up conciliation meeting was scheduled for the following afternoon.
Currently, only the second and fourth Saturdays of each month are designated holidays, while the first, third, and fifth Saturdays remain working days. Venkatachalam explained that employees had already agreed to extend their working hours on weekdays in exchange for having all Saturdays off.
Union representatives traced the history of this demand back to 2015, when banks first agreed in principle to a five-day workweek, resulting in two Saturdays becoming holidays. The matter was revisited in 2020 and eventually formalized in the wage settlement signed on March 8, 2024. Under this arrangement, employees agreed to work an additional 40 minutes daily from Monday to Friday in exchange for all Saturdays being declared holidays. Unions said this agreement was submitted to the finance ministry more than two years ago but has yet to receive government approval.
Kushal Gupta, senior vice president of the All India Punjab National Bank Officers' Association (AIPNBOA), emphasized that the five-day workweek issue was the primary motivation behind the strike, citing its impact on employees' work-life balance. He noted that the demand was first raised in 2012, and a 2015 written agreement had granted 24 Saturday holidays annually.
Unions also raised concerns about the government's failure to honor a 2020 agreement establishing a uniform incentive scheme based on overall bank performance, with payouts ranging from five to fifteen days' wages depending on profitability. One union statement criticized the government's revised approach, describing it as a discriminatory scheme based on individual performance that creates division among the workforce.