AIBOC CIRCULAR NO. 108 DATED 23.12.2011

AIBOC issued its circular No. 108 dated 23.12.2011 on meeting with the Govt. Representative. We are placing the same here for our readers.

CIRCULAR NO. 108                                                                         DATE: 23.12.2011

TO ALL AFFILIATES/MEMBERS:

MEETING WITH THE GOVERNMENT REPRESENTATIVE

In accordance with the decision of the General Secretaries meeting held on 8th December, 2011 at Bangalore, the Sub-Committee consisting of following members, on Khandelwal Committee Recommendations, met on 22nd December 2011, at Delhi.

S.Shri

P.K. Sarkar

G.D. Nadaf

K.D. Khera

T.N. Goel

T.T. Natarajan

Harvindar Singh

Peddi Sudhakar

J.D. Sharma

After thread bare discussions, they finalized our views on 56 recommendations of the Khandelwal Committee, accepted by the Government of India and forwarded to the CEO’s of PSBs for approval in their respective Boards. A copy of our letter dated 22.12.2011 addressed to Shri. D.K. Mittal, Secretary, Department of Financial Services is enclosed for your information.

The appointment taken with Shri. Mittal was utilized to submit our above referred letter. We briefed on the issues listed in our letter  and requested for a structured forum  at Government level for regular interaction on service matters. We also requested him to consider our issues pending with Government such as, Compassionate Appointment Scheme, denial of 2nd Option Pension to officers opted  VRS /Resignees, improvements to staff loans, welfare fund, festival advance, promotion guidelines, RRB merger etc.,

The Secretary, Financial Services was kind enough to listen to us patiently and responded  positively to our suggestions to have a structured consultation forum at Government level on HR matters. He assured us to look in to our suggestions on Khandelwal Committee recommendations and also on other  suggestions. He may give us one more chance to discuss on the issues during the first week of January, 2012, on the Khandelwal Committee recommendations, for fine tuning etc.

We are happy with the response of Shri. Mittal, and confident that, majority  of  issues may get resolved through our direct presentation to the Government. We shall keep advise of the further developments in due course.

With greetings

Sd/-

(G.D. NADAF)

GENERAL SECRETARY

To,

Shri D.K.Mittal,

Secretary, Financial Services

Government of India,

Department of Financial Services,

NEW DELHI

Respected Sir,

RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE KHANDELWAL COMMITTEE

We refer to the Government of India, Ministry of Finance, Department of Financial Services letter F.No. 9/18/209-IR dated 21st October, 2011 addressed to the CEOs of all Public Sector Banks, on the captioned matter.

We were also given an opportunity to present our organisational views before the Dr. Khandelwal Committee during April 2010. We made our verbal presentation and also submitted a Memorandum to the Chairman of the HR Committee, vide our letter No: 1452/113/10 dated 7th April, 2010. (Copy enclosed)

We expected that, one more chance will be given to our organisation i.e., All India Bank Officers’ Confederation, (AIBOC), which is the majority organisation for officers in the Banking Industry with 2.5 lac membership in Public Sector, Private Sector, RRBs and Co-operative Sectors, to present our views on the report of the Committee before its recommendations are accepted by the Government of India. We understand that, the Committee has submitted its report to the Government of India on 24th June, 2010; grouped into 13 chapters and 105 recommendations for consideration. Now, we understand that, Government of India has instructed CEOs of all Public Sector Banks to prepare HR plan incorporating 56 recommendations of the Committee and get approval by the Board, latest by 31st December, 2011.

In this connection, we submit the following for your kind consideration:        

Ø  An Opportunity to present our views: An opportunity be given to our Confederation to present our views on all the recommendations of the HR Committee, before those are accepted by the Government.

Ø  Deferment of the last day: The deadline of 31st December, 2011; fixed by Government of India, for approval of the respective Board of the Banks to accept 56 recommendations, may please be deferred, to enable us to make our suggestions.

Manpower Planning: There is an urgent need to review the Man Power Planning in Banks. Adhoc decisions are taken by the Management in assessing and filling up of vacancies. The technology and CBS have not reduced risk, responsibility, and accountability of the Bank Officers. In fact workload on officers has increased after implementation of CBS. We agree that both short term and long term MPP is essential. In addition to the help of the outside experts, majority Officers’ Association in the Banks shall also be consulted to assess the need of the adequate staff strength. Reduction of clerical staff should not result into officers doing clerical work, resulting in non-adherence of maker checker concept. Therefore, we suggest that, apart from our representatives on the Board of the Banks, recognized majority Officers’ Association representative may be included in the proposed Steering Committee of the Board on HR.

Outsourcing: The risk, responsibility of supervising staff in connection with outsourced work has to be specified clearly.  The routine banking transactions like, accepting deposits, granting loans, recovery, verifying  KYC norms, auditing, inspection etc. by the outsourced agencies are fraught with avoidable financial and also credibility risk. The issue needs further deliberations to identify non-core activities to be outsourced. On implementation of BPR and Change Management, views/suggestions of our affiliates may be taken at Bank level.

Recruitment: The present system of recruitment of direct officers up to a maximum of 25% of the vacancies, in Scale – I, may be retained to motivate and retain talent in the Bank. The Banking requires a proper mix of talent and experience.

Incentive: Appropriate incentives and weightage in promotion for serving in rural branches may be worked out for supervising staff also.

ESOP have been creating discontentment in those Private Sector Banks where it is in vogue. It has caused IR conflicts, agitation, unrest and strikes. Implementing the concept of ESOP in Public Sector Banks is fraught with similar risks and hence undesirable.

It is suggested that the Banks, which achieve the targets fixed under Statement of Intent (SOI) are allowed to share a portion of Profit with entire staff, since the achievement of targets is a team effort.

Lateral Recruitment: The number of lateral recruitments in specialized jobs at senior level, on permanent basis, shall be kept at a minimum, and internal talent be groomed to manage those sensitive positions also.

HRD Plan: We agree that, there is a need to come out with HRD plan for development of women, SC/ST and disabled employees. To encourage women, on the lines of 6th pay commission recommendations, two years sabbatical leave for them may be considered. A special training may be designed for these categories of staff.

Leadership Development: A comprehensive Leadership Development strategy is required for all categories of staff. HR Departments in consultation with the Officers’ Associations may design the programme.

Grievance Redressal: At present, grievances of Officers are resolved by the HR Department in consultation with the recognized Officers’ Association, within the framework of ‘Bilateral Agreements’. The system is functioning well. Therefore, there is no need to introduce online resolution of grievances. This will be viewed as an effort to deunionize Bank Officers by the managements and may affect the industrial relations in the Banks.

Extension of Service: There are already laid down instructions as regards extension of service on attaining the age of 50 years or 30 years of service whichever occurs earlier. Therefore, the clause of pre-mature retirement of non-performers at the age of 55 is unwarranted. The recommendation may please be rejected.

Testing of computer skills of officers and clerical staff: On the face of it, we will think that this is a good idea, but the report is silent on imparting training where required and utilising the manpower.

Mandatory rural assignments for clerks: Most of the new recruits may end up in rural and semi-urban branches. The rural assignment if made compulsory, should count for  mandatory service in the officer cadre also.

Promotion: Fast-tracking promotions can be done to a certain extent depending on the shortage in various banks but cannot be common for all banks. There is also the issue of insufficient branch experience before officers reach Senior Management grade. If they are promoted too fast, this may not be possible. A balance has to be arrived at. The frustration level may increase, if stagnation occurs. These officers will join other Private Sector Banks making Public Sector Banks a recruitment ground for the proposed new Generation Private Sector Banks.

xv.       Bilateralism: The existing bilateral understandings and agreements between Bank Managements and officers’ organisations in the area of promotions, transfers and service conditions may be allowed to continue.

On other recommendations of the HR Committee, we shall provide our views later.

We thank you for providing us an opportunity to place our views on the 56 recommendations of HR Committee, accepted by the Government of India.

We hope that, our suggestions will be considered favourably. We once again pledge our support for implementation of financial inclusion and rural upliftment programme with all seriousness.    

We remain grateful to you Sir,

Yours faithfully,

Sd/-

(G.D. NADAF)

GENERAL SECRETARY