The Kerala State Committee of All India Bank Officers Confederation (AIBOC) condemned the move to implicate the branch manager of Canara Bank in a case involving the suicide of a mother and daughter.

The incident had occurred on Tuesday at Neyyattinkara near here and the bank was blamed for triggering the the incident after it had allegedly enforced recovery procedures on a defaulted housing loan.

'No direct charge'

But a day after, a suicide note recovered from the site had attributed extraneous reasons, including domestic violence for the tragedy, and did not seem to make any direct charge against the bank.

The intervening day on Wednesday, however, saw political activists targeting a number of branches of Canara Bank and ransacking some, including the main office of the branch in Thiruvananthapuram.

Abraham Shaji John, State Secretary, AIBOC, said that the bank had only tried to enforce legal procedures to recover dues and was not responsible for the unfortunate suicides.

The state committee of the AIBOC also deplored the tendency to unleash acts of aggression against banks and bank officers on the basis of unsubstantiated facts or events.

As trustees of public money, it is the routine job of bank officer to lend it to different sections of the society for various activities as well as ensuring it returns to the system in good time.

Natural course

It is only natural that banks resort to recovery measures as permitted by the law to recover non-performing assets. Canara Bank branch had sought to do only that, Abraham Shaji John said.

"In fact, in the instant case, the local branch manager had, in a gesture of empathy, extended action under the SARFAESI Act for years together. It was invoked nine years after the account had turned an NPA," he said.

Banks are only trying to comply with stringent provisioning norms of the Reserve Bank and achieve performance targets set by the Centre.

"The power of branch managers to extend/modify repayment of NPA accounts is very limited. So they are caught between the devil and the deep sea."

Blaming bank officers without ascertaining facts and raising demands to register criminal case against the branch manager will only mislead the public and further demoralise officers.

This doesn't augur well for a matured political leadership. Officers must be enabled to perform their duties without fear or favour, which alone can ensure a robust banking industry.