Officers' union requests Narendra Modi to defer mega bank merger amidst coronavirus pandemic

Representational image. Reuters.[/caption]The entire exercise of the merger process involves a huge number of tasks requiring constant interaction and congregation of the employees of the anchor and target banks and representatives of outsourced consultants, agencies etc.These tasks in the current state of affairs are unwarranted particularly in view of the 'break the chain' effort undertaken by the government to combat the spread of the fatal disease, it said.If the merger process is initiated, thousands of bank employees and officers and executives involved in the process will be exposed to the risk of their livesand in turn, may cause further contamination to other people who need to be interacted with."It may be argued that these activities can be carried out through video conferencing, but it should be borne in mind simultaneously that these are complex tasks, where apart from video conferencing, several meetings will also be required to be held among the rank and file of the banks involved in order to ensure accomplishment of the job of assimilation and integration of the systems and processes," it said.Click here to follow LIVE updates on coronavirus outbreak"As a progressive trade union, we strongly feel that the priority before the country is to come out from the colossal threat of loss of precious human lives, which is unprecedented in independent India and repair the damages being caused to the national economy as a natural fallout of the Coronavirus endemic," it said.