SBI To Shut Its Bank Branches, Reduce Employee Strength: This Is What Govt. Says

In response to a member's query which asked whether the centre plans to close down SBI branches across the country and replace them with e-corners and to the other question that asked whether the administration proposes to trim workforce strength of 16 lakh of the bank by March 2021, Anurag Thakur, Minister of State for Finance in a written reply to the parliament said there is no plan either to shut down bank's branches or reduce employee base of the country's leading PSU lender.

" State Bank of India has informed that its approximate present staff strength is 2.5 lakh and no reduction in the number of employees is envisaged by March 2021, and that there is no plan to shut down bank branches throughout the country and substitute them with e-corners," said Thakur.

In January a report by SBI Research said that India is adding a minimum of 16 lakh payrolls in FY20. "The Indian economy is expected to expand at 5% in FY20 (SBI:4.6%). The slow growth is now having a visible impact on payroll creation. In FY19, India had created 89.7 lakh new payrolls as per the EPFO data. In FY20, as per current projected this number could be at least 15.8 lakh lower", added the report.

"The EPFO data primarily covers low paid jobs as the salary is capped at Rs 15,000 per month. Government jobs, State Government jobs and Private jobs are not part of this ambit as such data have moved to NPS beginning 2004. Interestingly, even in the NPS category, State and Central Government are supposed to create close to 39,000 jobs less in FY20 as per current trends. Hence, the number of new payroll created in FY20 could be at least 16 lakh lower than in FY19," said the report.

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