Not a single employee was laid off or removed as part of the merger of five associate banks with State Bank of India, the government said, adding that the bank had no plans to offer VRS options to its employees.
“SBI has informed that no employee has been removed after merger and no application was submitted by the employee unions or employees against retrenchment and merger,” the central government said in a statement.
It also said there are no plans to offer any incentives to existing SBI employees to go for voluntary retirement scheme.
The bank had offered employees of the five associate banks, such as State Bank of Mysore, State Bank of Travancore and others, the option of going for voluntary retirement instead of joining the parent bank via merger. However, no such facility is being extended to employees of the parent company, the government said.
“There is no plan to launch VRS in (SBI),” it said.
SBI is India’s largest bank with close to 3 lakh employees and 24,000 branches.
On 1st April, 2017, State Bank of India, which is India’s largest Bank merged with five of its Associate Banks (State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur, State Bank of Hyderabad, State Bank of Mysore, State Bank of Patiala and State Bank of Travancore) and Bharatiya Mahila Bank with itself.
This is the first ever large scale consolidation in India and more are likely to follow.
The roots of the State Bank of India lie in the first decade of the 19th century, when the Bank of np later renamed the Bank of Bengal, was established on 2 June 1806.
The Bank of Bengal was one of three Presidency banks, the other two being the Bank of Bombay (incorporated on 15 April 1840) and the Bank of Madras (incorporated on 1 July 1843).