The United Forum of Bank Unions has called for a nation-wide strike of the bank employees by mid of December to protest for the proposed amalgamation of the three public sector banks - Bank of Baroda, Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank.

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C H Venkatachalam, General Secretary, All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA) stated that the protest is against the Centre's policy of bank amalgamation. "A final date for the strike will be decided in the first week of November. We have experienced these mergers in case of SBI and its associate banks, which has not been a good experience. There are branches which were closed down resulting into lesser employment opportunity," he said here during a media interaction.

He further said, "Since merger of its associate banks, the SBI has closed down 1,600 branches, while 5,000 more are on the radar. During last 10 years, SBI along with associate banks saw 60,000 new recruits every year, while this year after the merger, the bank is taking about 5,000 new recruits. This is affecting employment in banking."

He also stated that the amalgamations and mergers do not help in bringing down the non-performing assets either.

"The total NPAs of the SBI Group (including associate banks) was Rs 1.77 lakh crore as of March 2017, which rose to Rs 2.25 lakh crore in March 2018."

Venkatachalam further stated that the bank employees will also join the Central Trade Union Convention in a strike call for January 8-9 in the next year. "Today, labour laws are weakened and minimum livelihood is not assured. Therefore, the Unions have decided to join together in this strike call," he added.

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