Mehbooba raises J&K Bank PSU issue with Arun Jaitley

Says Union Finance Minister assured her of re-examining the matter

Jammu and Kashmir Bank employees’ union office-bearers at a press conference in Srinagar on Wednesday.

Protests over Governor Satya Pal Malik’s recent decision to declare J&K Bank as a public sector undertaking gained political momentum on Wednesday with former Chief Minister and Peoples Democratic Party president Mehbooba Mufti raising the issue with Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

“I spoke with Jaitley ji about the intrusive and regressive move to declare J&K Bank as a PSU. This decision will add to the woes of the State and alienate them further,” said Ms. Mufti. She claimed the Union Minister assured that the government will re-examine the matter.

Both the National Conference and the PDP have opposed the move by the Governor-headed State Administrative Council’s decision to declare the bank as a PSU and “rob its independence”.

Valley-based civil society group Kashmir Centre for Social and Development Studies also held a meeting in Srinagar on Tuesday over the issue.

“It’s the only bank in the State that continued to pump credit into economic sectors. The decision of the SAC is a conspiracy to disempower people of Kashmir and cripple them economically. J&K Bank needs lots of reforms to maintain transparency but it has to run independent of bureaucratic wrangles and complexities,” said a KCSDS spokesman.

Employees plan strike

Sources said the employees’ union of the bank, which met in Srinagar on Wednesday, were mulling a strike over the issue.

The Governor’s administration had clarified that the government had "no intention of interfering in the day-to-day affairs of the bank and its functional autonomy". Besides treating the bank as PSU, the SAC also brought the bank under the ambit of the Right to Information, asked it to follow Central Vigilance Commission guidelines and made it accountable to the Legislative Assembly with its annual report to be tabled in the House.

“Since the State government holds 60% of majority shares in J&K Bank, for all practical purposes, it is a PSU. Therefore all transparency and accountability features that arise from this have to apply to the bank,” a government spokesman had said defending the decision.