Letter to SBI MD by a pensioner

[natarajan pv]

---------- Forwarded message ---------

From: Srinivasa Rao Kankipati <ksra...@gmail.com>

Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2020 at 21:04

Subject: Plight of older SBI pensioners

To: <chai...@sbi.co.in>

Dear.  ++++++                                                                                   16 Apr 2020

I am Dr K Srinivasa Rao. I retired as Chief General Manager, SBI, in 1994. I am now 85 years old.

I felt very happy to hear from you now, that I am part of the SBI family. I had also taken it that I belonged to the SBI family, but the reaction from the Bank always made me question whether the Bank was also regarding me -  as well as other old pensioners - as belonging to SBI family.

Your recent inclusion of the old pensioners in the family was therefore sweet music to my ears. When I woke up from the enjoyment of the music, I realised that this was done for the purpose of getting some money from me and not the other way round. In better financial circumstances, I would have readily responded with money for an urgent and noble cause, but unfortunately my financial position caused by a despicable monthly pension does not permit this. More so because I had just then made a small contribution as a citizen already to other agencies, leaving nothing precious to be channelled through SBI. Sorry for this.

I get a pension of about Rs.29,000. Every six months, I get an increment of about Rs.500. The increment enables me to purchase one 5 liter bottle of Sunflower oil, plus some soaps and toothpaste, at discounted rate. Sometimes I am left with a small change and I take an autorickshaw to home. Sometimes I walk home, after spending that amount to take tea at a wayside shop, knowing that both a walk and tea are good for health. Continued good health of old pensioners puts undue strain on Bank’s finances through compulsory payment of pension to them. Eventually, Bank may therefore ordain that a pensioner living beyond a specified age will not get pension, but only a small lumpsum payment to the survivors if they undertake to lay the pensioner to permanent rest.

I joined SBI in 1957 as a Probationary Officer. The day for my interview by the Bank’s Local Board was clashing with the date for my “Projective Geometry” paper of 150 marks in my final MA (math) exam. I took the University Professor’s special permission, rushed to Madras, faced the Local Board, came back and took the final paper on “Advanced Dynamics”. The salary of Rs.500 per month being offered by SBI in those days for Probationary Officers was attractive, and my Professor understood my need for such a plum job. It was a gamble as, after being successful in the Local Board interview, I was asked to go to Bombay for an interview by the Bank’sCentral Board.

Luckily I was selected by the Bank as PO. Not only that, I stood second in the University, with the first scoring only 5 marks more than me even though I had lost 150 marks. The first ranker went on to become a Vice Chancellor, and even now reprimands me for leaving the academic world in preference to a Bank job. 

Then why had I not chosen Academia?

Because an SBI job in those days was one of the best in the market, and I liked it. Even though it was a bit too much of a peeping into a faraway future, I thought that Bank’s pension also would make my retired life comfortable.

(Not to lose touch with academics which was my first love, I did PhD in Economics while I was working as the first CRM of Visakhapatnam module in 1980-83).

The reason for my quoting this incident is that this Vice Chancellor some years ago asked me to join him in distributing awards in Hyderabad to the winners of a Mathematics Olympiad, because of my continued interest and involvement in advanced mathematics.

On the stage, while the function was going on, a retired teacher was distributing a pamphlet written in vernacular and he gave me a copy. I took it home and found that it was his appeal to the State Government, stating that during his days as a teacher the economy was a cheap economy, with low incomes, which did not leave him much by way of savings. So, he appealed to the Govt to raise the pension of teachers of his rank, to face the present day inflation and lead a decent life. 

I concluded that he was getting a measly pension compared to my own lofty pension in SBI. So I phoned him after reaching home to sympathise with him. When I asked him about the amount, he said, “Only Rs.45,000 Sir”. I immediately put down the phone. I knew that in return he would ask me for my pension figure, which was less than Rs.20,000. If I disclosed this, he might show sympathy for me instead of the other way round. He might even show contempt for SBI. I felt my patron institution SBI did not deserve this from outsiders.

A retired Hindi-teaching teacher in my Apartment Complex is a friend of mine. He is in bad health. But I suspected that his ill-health may be due to financial troubles caused by insufficient pension and asked him about it. He said, “ No, Sir, no money issues. Every month on the first day, the State government credits Rs.54,000 to my account. And it goes on increasing periodically. It is only my health which is bothering me.”

Another jolt that I received very recently was from a Professor of Economics. Mind you, he retired from a government-aided college, not from a government college. When I and my friends asked him, during a chat with him, about his pension, he said, “ Oh, that is no problem. I get Rs.94,000 per month. Sometimes I don't know how to spend the full amount”.

A Geological Survey of India official who became a friend of mine in Hyderabad, told me that he is getting nearly Rs.1,00,000 per month as pension. (Please count the zeros carefully).

Is it not a shame that SBI pensioners are paid less than even school teachers?

Pensions have gone up all over in India, in keeping with the inflation. That is, except in the institution called State Bank of India. IAS officers (“I Am Safe”) have a knack of getting Pay Commissions appointed to recommend increases in salaries and pensions. In Defence Services, they have now “One Rank, One Pay” policy. The present pensioners get 50% of the latest salary of persons of the rank to which they belonged when they retired. No need to mention about the pay, perqs and pensions of MPs and MLAs and MLCs.

In the very early stages after nationalisation of the Imperial Bank of India, SBI was known as a good paymaster. I have the list of officers in IBI in 1920s, and they were getting princely salaries. Over the years, other banks have overtaken SBI. SBI has deftly managed to keep its pensioners ill-paid, by quoting outside sources as authority for its action, or rather inaction. Old pensioners are regarded by SBI as a drag on the Bank and worth discarding. They are regarded as good “Use and Throw” material.

In our days we did not have computers, internet and the like to conduct bank transactions. Everything had to be done manually using big books and big ledgers. On Fridays, when it is the duty of a designated official at any branch to send the Weekly Telegram to Central Accounts Office, Calcutta, he had to see that the day’s books are balanced without even a discrepancy of one paisa, because that discrepancy may be actually hiding in the figures relating to thousands and lakhs. I myself had to deliver the telegram personally at the Central telegraph Office when I was working in Bangalore Cantonment Branch in 1959-61. 

At other times when I closed my department (I was in charge of the Foreign Exchange Department and once I encashed cheques for Kurt Tank, Hitler’s pilot) and started going home, the bank guard used to greet me, “Good Morning, Sir”. The time was 1 am or 2 am in the night.

Even though most living, old pensioners did a wonderful job working day and night to bring the SBI to its present stature and size, I am naturally more familiar with what I did personally. So it would not be out of place to mention a few, at the risk of being thought to be boastful.

When the great Mr RK Talwar became the Chairman, I was posted to Central Office as Addl Chief Officer (Operations) from Hyderabad where I was Dy Chief Accountant at the Main Branch. Mr Talwar was the S&T (secretary & Treasurer ie CGM) of Hyderabad Circle. When people asked me who our S&T was, I used to pun “StalwarT”. Nobody disagreed with me as he really was a stalwart, unlike some puny people who succeeded him.

While in Central Office, I changed the Bank’s Drafts System, redesigned draft forms to make them difficult to alter and commit fraud by inventing a color-code system for different denominations like OT (One Thousand), TT, OL and TL, introduced a punching mechanism at the issuing office to prevent change of amount, and also computerised the entire reconciliation system with the then available help of Tata Consultants.

I argued with RBI that the provisions of interest being made by the Bank every month are not strictly deposits, and so CRR and SLR need not be maintained thereon. With the permission of RBI, I took out crores of rupees from reserve maintenance requirements at once improving the liquidity of funds. Funds became available for loans and advances.

I changed the way Transfer Pricing was being applied in SBI. In the old days the difference between deposits and advances at a branch was supposed to be lent to or borrowed from Central Office at a specified interest rate. I separated them and fixed CO Interests which made branches profitable, depending on their capability to exploit local areas separately for deposits and for advances.

I was selected for the SBI Reorganisation Team of 1972 and was in charge of introducing budgeting in SBI in coordination with our consulting professors at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. The professors knew very little of banking, and our Management knew even less of modern management methods, governing by favours and punishments ie by carrot and cane. I had to act as a via media. I introduced budgeting, wrote the Budget Manual and also was the author of the PERT (Programme Evaluation and Review Technique), a huge tech-savvy chart showing which agency in the Bank had to act at which time in coordination with which other agency/agencies. The result was that both Reorganisation and Budgeting were ushered in by the Bank like a perfect clockwork, without even a query or display of doubt from any quarter. Budgeting was later copied by all other banks in India.

The expectation of all pensioners was that if you work hard and are loyal to the Bank, the Bank will make your life reasonably comfortable after your laying down of office. Unfortunately that has not been happening.

Even during service, personal prejudice and politics of favouritism and regionalism were rampant, even though in any organisation these must be expected to some extent. Sharu Rangnekar, the renowned Management Expert, after studying SBI, said even in 1963 while giving a talk in our Staff College in Hyderabad, that in SBI, “the Management plays soft with the Unions, using the middle level officers as a buffer”. Undeniably true. 

For all my work in Central Office, when a new Chairman came who did not like the old Chairman, I was transferred to Allahabad Branch, where the previous incumbent never got his family to reside in the bank quarters situated above the banking hall, because the union there promised to rape his daughter and kidnap his son. 

The reason for my posting to this Branch which had the reputation of the worst branch in India was peculiar:

At one time, RBI, to control Money Supply, wanted the banks to manage CRR with their own internal funds but SBI had to borrow from RBI against its securities to shore up the CRR which was falling. The Dy MD did not understand the mechanism, and wanted me to manage it somehow every week.  I could put up my personal funds to the extent of Rs.300, or Rs.3000, or even Rs.30,000 somehow, but not Rs.3 crores. By slip of tongue, I mentioned it to the PA, who immediately conveyed it to the Dy MD who immediately transferred me to Allahabad Branch as a punishment. I was a Systems Man and not a Staff Man, and had to face for three years the branch  Union’s rowdyism, defiance, indiscipline, daily demonstrations, strikes and harassment of customers. It was a great moment of joy for me that I got a letter from the union troublemaker himself, after my transfer to Visakhapatnam to start the new module, stating that he appreciated my energy and enthusiasm. I still keep the letter.

If not exactly the above kind, some kind of problems are no doubt faced by all officers in their careers. All this they put up with because they would like to retire in peace and spend their post-service life in tranquility with reasonable income flow. Unfortunately, SBI is doing a great disservice to retired personnel in this matter, even when it has enough applicable funds. It has taken a queer pleasure in orphaning the old retirees.

My co-pensioners Sri PPR Upadhyaya and Sri S Govindarajan (retd MD) have made forceful representations to you about the plight of the old pensioners of SBI.  They have pointed out how the Courts have judged that pension is not a bounty but a right of the pensioners. Other retirees have also been making appeals to you.  They have all requested you to set right the injustice meted out to SBI pensioners.

It is stunning how the SBI is allowing a totally outside agency like the DFS to take decisions on its behalf even though its own Act and Pension Fund Rules empower the Bank to take its own decisions without allowing other powers to breathe down its neck.  Bank’s consulting DFS, or DFS interfering in the Bank's internal decision-making process, is a sign of Bank Chairmen’s weakness or their eagerness to pick up loaves and fishes of office which the Finance Ministry would throw at them post-retirement. This is like allowing a local municipal councillor to run the family of a voter, simply because the councillor bribes the voter with drink and cash at the time of elections. This is not acceptable.

“No sensible authority in DFS will instruct SBI to defy Court judgements and follow his own free and unsolicited advice. Probably some Head Clerk in DFS is formulating the policy for SBI and SBI is blindly following it. Why don’t you come out in defiance of the DFS and in defence of the old pensioners?” -  This is the cry and appeal of the old pensioners of SBI, like me, to you.

Please be not afraid that DFS will take action against you. They cannot. On the contrary, they are bound to remember you for your heroism in lifting crores of rupees from SBI to uplift the YES Bank. How can they forget you when your present assignment as SBI Chairman comes to a close and they have to use your energy, capability, leadership, farsight and vision,  to our country’s advantage in a new posting for you?

Old pensioners will always remember you for shaking off the self-imposed fear of DFS and unwillingness to follow Court orders. They will remember you for extending to them immediately the following payments due to them for a long time:

i) Arrears of differential amounts to the extent of 50% of their average substantive monthly salary drawn in the last 12 months’ pensionable service with 100% neutralisation in D.A for all, with 9% interest.

ii) Arrears of updated pension, payable from 1.4.1998, to all the surviving pensioners as on that date, with 9% interest.

iii) Arrears of family pension as approved by the Supreme Court in its judgment dated 23.2.1989,  with 9% interest.

Please forgive me for stealing your time to make you go through a rehash of pieces of my old work in SBI. I narrated them out of exasperation.

                                   In these days of grave threat from corona,

                                    Buddey pensioners ke liye kuchh corona?

With regards,

Sincerely,

Dr K. Srinivasa Rao.

To Sri Rajnish Kumar, Chairman, State Bank of India, Corporate Office, State Bank Bhavan, Backbay Reclamation, Mumbai.

Virus-free. www.avg.com

THANKS AND REGARDS,

P.V.NATARAJAN.‌
9445021712.

[Sanjay J]

Terrific !!!

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[Vathsala Lakshman]

Several letters have been written by pensioners of SBI to the Chairman SBI and in the personal name of Sri Rajnish Kumar, Chairman, but almost all the petitioners have complained that their letters have not been acknowledged even. The pensioners may be neglected by the authoritative head of the Institution, but he will have to face divine sentencing for the sin of leaving the old workhorses in the lurch, knowing fully well what their contribution to the Bank has been in the pre-computerization days, when they gave their sweat and blood to the Institution they had held dear to their heart. I do not want to say anything more except quote the adage,  " As you sow, so you reap. "

K.LAKSHMAN.

On Fri, Apr 24, 2020 at 3:54 PM 'natarajan pv' via bankpensioner <bankpe...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

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[Pravin V]

K . Laxmanan
You have not touched the point whether these worthy gentlemen (CGM and above) who innocently writing letters to SBI chairman has done anything for retirees when they were in active service and used to receive such emotional letters/appeals from retirees. Have they ever acknowledged such letters ? The answer will certainly be in negative. The reason is in SBI or for that matter in any PS Banks culture is to ignore such communications. So the principle “as you sow you will get “ applies to them also. Sorry for becoming blunt in expressing my views
Pravin Vaidya

[verinder kapahi]

when we visit uthala ceremony,there is a feeling ,always, that this will not happen to us.We forget every thing and become busy with immediate routine. Similarly, Chairman and others in active service,feel that they will never retire.

V.KAPAHI

[PJK MATHEW]

Dear V. Lakshman Sir, I also commented for it. Nearling 25 lakhs of CURSING will be on him ( In service employees+ pensioners + their families and their dependents). The Chairman/IBA chief is dreaming about his post retirement benefits. This  Indian system ...who will change it?. The Legislature . Executive ,and Judiciary stepping on others toes, which is making trouble and making very difficulty of common men to live. Where is the Fundamental rights  and dignity of life?  . We people worked hard for the institutions and that kicked us out from main life. In this very old age, there is no medical facility or enough pension to live. Where is the law to protect the weaker section. Surely there is a reaction from the NATURE it self.  No body can challenge  it including every one is preventing our lawful rights. Two laws for similar case is INJUSTICE.

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[Prasad C N]

Dear Shri Vaidya,

We completely agree with you.  

Thanks, a Million. 

With regards,

Prasad C N

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[P. S. SATYANARAYANA]

Present executives also will become retirees one day. Their representations then also will be dust-binned by the then executives.

Virus-free. www.avg.com

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[Anantharaman Tg]

But, there is one more thing we have to bear in mind.

The earlier people of the Bank were compelled to write

due to their present condition.

Let me stop with this. You can infer what is left out!!!

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[Vathsala Lakshman]

Yes, of course, Pravin Vaidya, but not all those who have now complained that their letters have remained unacknowledged, can be painted by us with the same brush we are using for Rajnish Kumar, as I find that some of them are fighting tooth and nail for the pensioners' cause and by that, we can surmise that they are the conscientious type and would not have been blind to the problems of the members of the SBI Family, when they were holding senior posts. There are always conflicting opinions on such matters and as the  saying goes, "East is East and West is West and the twain shall never meet."   I think it is futile to bother about this aspect,  at this juncture, when our joint front has to put up a fight against the Bank and its Chief, in the courtrooms, as also in various supplications to the powers that be.  Another aspect that we cannot gloss over in this context, is the manner in which our own Union leaders/ association heads had acted in the past many a time that was not in the interest of their own flock, let alone the cause of the pensioners. There are two sides to a coin and this should be borne in mind while appraising any issue involved. With this, I am closing my side of the debate on the subject, as it is futile to be wasting our time over hypothetical conjectures.

K.LAKSHMAN.

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