Workers seek five-day banking week and stage protest march, stage demonstrations

Bank employees affiliated to the United Forum of Banking Unions are staging a protest march in Hubballi on Friday. | Photo credit: KIRAN BAKALE

Bank employees affiliated to the United Forum of Banking Unions (UFBU) took out a protest march and staged a demonstration in Hubballi on Friday, demanding the introduction of a five-day banking week and urging the Center to address their long-pending demands.

The protest was held in response to the UFBU’s call for a nationwide strike on 9/11. The workers raised slogans demanding that the government introduce five-day banking, which they said had already been agreed in March 2024 and subsequently recommended to the government.

Addressing the protesters, union leaders said the demand for five-day banking has been settled for nearly two-and-a-half years despite repeated discussions with the IBA and the Department of Financial Services (DFS), the Treasury.

They said several rounds of discussions and conciliation meetings held in the days leading up to the strike did not yield a definitive timetable or concrete assurances from the government to implement the demand.

The unions said that during the conciliation process, the DFS informed them that the proposal for five-day banking was “under consideration” and urged them to postpone the strike. However, the UFBU argued that it could not call off the strike without a clear commitment or time-bound assurance.

The protestors also raised several other demands, including adequate recruitment of officials and menials, restoration of the old pension system instead of the national pension system, increase in gratuity cap, updating of pensions and uniform dependency allowance, revision of ex-gratia for pensioners before November 2022 and extension of the benefit to employees of private banks.

The union also demanded filling up of Workman and Office Director posts, introduction of leave bank and reimbursement of health insurance premiums to retired employees by banks.

Published – 11 Sep 2026 23:26 IST