Bank unions to intensify protest against proposed FRDI Bill

The government’s proposed Financial Resolution and Deposit Insurance (FRDI) Bill is facing strong resistance from bank unions as they threatened to go on a nationwide strike if the Bill is introduced in the winter session of Parliament, reports Business Standard.

The All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA), general secretary CH Venkatachalam secretary of one of the biggest unions in banking sector told The Hindu BusinessLine, "The government should not go ahead with the FRDI Bill as it is wrongly timed and unwarranted in India."

A meeting is scheduled to take place on Wednesday by Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI) in Chennai to discuss the next step. This will be followed by a meeting between all bank unions to form a united forum to oppose the Bill.

The unions conducted a depositors’ signature collection campaign which has 200,000 signatures and another 100,000 signed an online petition which would be sent to Lok Sabha speaker to scrap the Bill.

The report said that the signature campaign has asked the government to make the name of loan defaulters’ public every six months, ensure accountability of bank executives for bad loans and amend the loan recovery procedure. The unions also demanded that the government should declare wilful and deliberate defaulters as criminals.

The unions’ stance is that the depositors are at risk losing their money parked with the banks under the FRDI Bill as it supersedes all previous Acts.