Bank Employees Federation of India                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        NARESH PAUL CENTRE                                   53 Radha Bazar Lane, (1st Floor), Kolkata – 700 001 

                         

 Circular No. 51/2020   

 Dt. 20th Aug 2020 

To all Units, Affiliates, Office Bearers, CC & GC Members 

 Dear comrades,  

 Meeting of the Working Group for Workmen held with IBA  today  You are all aware that two Working Groups, one for the officers and the other for Workmen, have been formed for distribution of the corpus allotted for the Officers/Workmen amongst pay-slip components and working out other issues, if any, after discussion and agreement of Officers/Workmen Associations. BEFI has not been included in the Working Group for Workmen, as anticipated, after our refusal to sign the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 22.07.2020.  First meeting of the Working Group for Workmen was held today at Mumbai. There was no consultation within UFBU, prior to the meeting. We are coming across several communications issued in the name of different organizations severally and jointly. So far Workmen Unions are concerned no discussion took place with BEFI; neither prior to the meeting nor after.   We apprehend that in the meetings of the Working Groups separately for Workmen and Officers, the IBA will discuss only the issues related with allotments of corpus amongst the pay-slip components apart for reconstruction of the pay scale as per agreed loading. We assume that IBA will not discuss issues regarding increased loading; merger of special allowance with basic pay; 5 day banking; updation/revision of pension in line with RBI formula with the Working Groups separately unless the participating Unions put pressure.  Demanding improvement in MoU signed on 22.07.2020, we addressed letter to the Union Finance Minister and organized country wide protest demonstrations on 6th August 2020. Our observation is that the MoU miserably failed to fulfill minimum expectations of common employees and officers. The IBA, during the course of negotiation, did not consider the exemplary services rendered by common employees and officers in trying times and remained obstinate in their stand on many sensitive issues of our charter of demands, some of which are listed above. Our Units printed  posters consisting of  demands  which were  displayed  in branches/offices.  Some  of  the  Units  printed  booklets  in  vernacular explaining  the  reasons  of  our  not  signing  the  MoU;  also prepared  short videos  for  the  employees.  From  the  Head  Quarters  we  have  prepared  two campaign  videos,  one  in  English  and  the  other  in  Hindi. We  have  already  given  a  call  to  all  employees  and  officers,  working  as well  as  retired,  for  signing  an  online Peti tion addressed  to  the  Chairman of  Indian  Banks’  Association  and  the  Secretary  of  Ministry  of  Finance,  GoI. We  are  observing  that  employees  and  officers,  irrespective  of  union affiliations,  are  spontaneously  signing  the  Petition.  Quite  a  good  number of  our retired  colleagues  submitted  the  Petitions  to  the  recipients.  The comments  written  by  most  of  the  Petitioners  upheld  the  demands  we raised. From  our  Office  Bearer  and  Central  Committee  meeting  we  advised  our Units  and  Affiliates  to  hold  their  meetings,  pr eferably  in  virtual  form,  as many  of  our  comrades  may  not    be  able  to  attend  the  meetings  physically. We  are  informed  that  many  of  our  Units  and A ffiliates  have  already  held their  meetings  and  the  process  to  be  continued.  All  others,  who  are  yet  to initiat e,  are  requested  to  hold  their  meetings  immediately.  We  must  try  to reach  all  employees  and  officers  including  the  retirees  with  our  appeal  to submit  Petition  demanding  improvement  of  MoU.  We  have  introduced  our You  Tube  Channel on  74 th Independence  Day  wh ere  we  are  uploading various  campaign  materials.  All  our  members/activists  are that  for  mobilizing  support  on  the  demands  raised  by  us. We  have  decided  to  observe Demands Day on  the to make  use  of days  of  meetings of  Working  Group  highlighting  our  demands  for  improvement  of  MoU  by wearing  badges  and  displaying  posters/banners/flex etc.  The specimen of  badge/poster  will  be  sent  separately.  The  Units  are  requested to  initiate  preparations  immediately  in  this  regard. 

With  greetings, 

Yours  comradely, .

(Debasish  Basu  Chaudhury) General  Secretary