The Central Government has directed the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) and the bank unions to initiate discussions on November 16 and sort out issues to avoid an all-India bank strike on November 19.

This direction came at the conciliatory meeting chaired by the Chief Labour Commissioner (CLC) Ramis Thiru in the capital on Thursday.

“Our call for November 19 strike stands as of now. We hope that the issues may be sorted out. We prefer to sort it out bilaterally”, CH Venkatachalam, General Secretary of the All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) told businessline after the conciliatory meeting here.

It maybe recalled that AIBEA had called for an all India bank strike on November 19 to protest a range of issues including denial of 11th bipartite wage revision to employees of Catholic Syrian Bank and DBS Bank; outsourcing of permanent jobs (cash movement jobs and housekeeping jobs) and threat to job security in certain banks.

At Thursday’s meeting, the CLC wanted IBA and Bank unions to hold a bilateral discussion and report the outcome of the discussions. IBA has agreed to hold the bilateral meeting on November 16 in Mumbai, sources said.

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