Nearly one million bank officials across the country went on a daylong strike on Tuesday against various issues affecting the banking sector.
The strike didn't have much impact in Patna, as most ATMs stayed open, but services such as cheque and draft clearance and withdrawal from accounts were hit.
The bank employees have been pressing for banking reforms for many years now.
They are now also demanding compensation for extra work they did during notebandi, when people queued up to exchange notes after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced on the night of November 8 that 500 and 1,000-rupee notes were being scrapped with immediate effect.
Bank employees and officials sitting on strike under the banner of United Forum of Bank Unions said they were not paid compensation for the extra work they put in during the notebandi period.
"During the demonetisation period, from November 9 to December 30, work pressure was very high," Ghanshyam Prasad Srivastava, general secretary of State Bank of India Officers Association (SBIOA), said. "We worked day and night, without offering any resistance, in the larger interest of the nation. But the government did not pay us for the extra work we did."
According to the State Bank of India Officers' Association (SBIOA), the bank employees and officials were compensated for three days (November 10, 11 and 12); employees were paid Rs 18,000 each for working on those three days.
Sanjay Kumar Singh, general secretary of the State Bank of India Staff Association (SBISA), claimed it was not like the bank employees worked for only those three days. There were many other days when employees had to work till late in the night.
Bank employees of Patna circle worked even on public holidays like November 14, while banks in other parts of the country were closed on account of Guru Nanak Jayanti.
Banks used to stay open for customers till 4pm during the demonetisation period.
After that the employees carried out tallying of all currency notes. That apart, in the evening, bank officials had to give a report to their head office about daily work through videoconferencing. The information shared by bank officials during video-conferencing included the number of functional ATMs and cash dispersed and exchanged during the day.
Apart from compensation to be paid for extra work that bank employees did during the notebandi period, their other demands include early initiation of the process of next wage revision of bank employees, adequate recruitment in all cadres, stringent measures to recover bad loans and accountability of top executives in case of loan defaulters.
Besides, they are also demanding appointment for those on compensation ground, five-day week, revision of family pension, salary increment and putting a ban on outsourcing of employees at banks among others.
Sources said more than 10 lakh employees under the banner of United Forum of Banks Union participated in the day's strike covering 70,000 bank branches from 26 public sector banks.
In Bihar around 72,000 employees went on strike in around 6,800 bank branches.
The United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) is an umbrella body of nine unions, but two of the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh affiliates - National Organization of Bank Workers and National Organisation of Bank officers - did not participate in the strike on Tuesday.
Though public sector bank unions had given the call for the daylong strike, services at private banks were also hit.
Private banks on Exhibition Road and Fraser Road - such as ICICI bank, HDFC, Kotak Mahindra and Axis Bank - were also shut.
The biggest respite for residents was that ATMs were functioning normally.
Himanshu Pandey, who was spotted at an SBI ATM at Gandhi Maidan, said: "As ATMs are functioning normally, the bank strike has not affected us much. Had the bank strike lingered for more than a day it would have affected ATMs too." Sources said that all banks had filled cash in their ATMs on Monday evening itself to meet any possible cash crunch.
