The two-day nationwide bank strike called by the bank unions for December 16-17 stands with the last-minute efforts through the conciliatory talks invited by the Additional Chief Labour Commissioner on Wednesday yielding no assurance from the government on the contentious privatisation Bill.

Bank unions are going ahead with the planned strike as no formal assurance came from the Government that the proposed Banking privatisation Bill will not be introduced in the ongoing winter session of Parliament, C H Venkatachalam, General Secretary, All India Bank Employees Association ( AIBEA) told BusinessLine .

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Further to the conciliation meeting held by the Addl. Chief Labour Commissioner on Tuesday in his office in Delhi, today one more round of conciliation meeting was held by him at 4 pm, Venkatachalam said.

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Representatives of Unions, Indian Banks and Association and Finance Ministry participated.

“We reiterated our stand that if the Government would assure that the Bank Privatisation Bill ( Banking Laws(Amendment) Bill, 2021 )would not be tabled during this session of the Parliament, we would be inclined to reconsider the strike.But Government could not give any such assurance to us”, he said.

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Hence, as per the call given by the United Forum of Bank Unions, it has been decided to go ahead with the strike action on December 16 and 17.

“We tried our best to avert the strike to avoid inconvenience to banking public. But because Government was not forthcoming, we have to implement the strike call”, Venkatachalam added.

The strike is to defend and preserve public sector banks and oppose privatisation of Banks, he added.

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