New Delhi/Mumbai: With two days to go before a nationwide strike, the row over the sale of IDBI Bank has shifted from the political to the procedural, with the government defending its bidding process and employees pressing ahead with a two-day hunger strike on November 2 and 3.
The United Forum of IDBI Officers and Employees, which groups the All India IDBI Officers' Association and the All India Industrial Development Bank Employees' Association, has demanded that the Centre buy at least another 6 per cent of the bank, from LIC or the open market, to keep its holding at 51 per cent. It has also sought a written statutory assurance protecting service conditions, welfare measures, pension entitlements and reservation policies, and an option for staff to move to public sector banks without losing seniority and retirement benefits. The forum has warned of prolonged or indefinite action if the demands are not met.
The United Forum of Bank Unions has backed the agitation.
Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi, who wrote to IDBI Bank employees on October 29, has said he stands with them and supports their legitimate demands, questioning why a bank that returned to profit was being sold to a Canadian company.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman rejected the criticism on Friday, saying all due process had been followed and that Congress-era governments had run banks as "personal entities", naming Videocon, Winsome, ABG Shipyard and Kingfisher among borrowers whose loans became bad debts. She said the bank was revived with more than Rs 25,000 crore of recapitalisation and is "poised for its next phase of growth".
The Department of Investment and Public Asset Management, in a clarification on Thursday, said the reserve price for the stake was neither raised nor lowered and that the second, or best-offer, round was run under a procedure set by the Core Group of Secretaries on Disinvestment. It said the revised process raised the discovered bid value by Rs 3,917 crore.
The government on October 14 approved the sale of a combined 60.72 per cent stake, 30.48 per cent held by the Centre and 30.24 per cent by LIC, to 10955230 Canada Inc, a Fairfax Financial Holdings subsidiary, for Rs 52,878 crore. The Centre and LIC will retain 15 per cent and 19 per cent respectively. The deal needs Reserve Bank of India clearance and is expected to close this financial year.
(With inputs from PTI and media reports)