Banking services across large parts of the country were disrupted on Tuesday as bank employees and officers went on a nationwide strike demanding the immediate implementation of a five-day work week, with all Saturdays declared holidays. The strike was called by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU), an umbrella body representing nine major unions in the banking sector.
Most branches of public sector banks (PSBs) are either fully closed or partially operational as officers and staff participated in the strike. Services such as cash deposits and withdrawals, cheque clearances and routine administrative work are affected at banks including State Bank of India (SBI), Punjab National Bank (PNB) and Bank of Baroda, among others.
Digital banking services, including UPI payments and internet banking, continued without major disruption.
In a statement, UFBU says the strike is observed by around 800,000 bank employees and officers working across PSBs, private sector banks, foreign banks, regional rural banks and cooperative banks. In a statement, the forum described the strike as a 'total success' and says bank staff across the country held demonstrations demanding the implementation of a five-day work week in the banking industry.
The unions are pressing for government approval to declare all remaining Saturdays as holidays, in line with recommendations made by the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) following memorandums of understanding signed between the IBA and UFBU in December 2023 and the settlement and joint note signed in March 2024. At present, only the second and fourth Saturdays of every month are bank holidays.
According to UFBU, the demand for a five-day work week has been pending for years. In the 2015 settlement, the government and the IBA had agreed to declare the second and fourth Saturdays as holidays, while assuring unions that the remaining Saturdays would be considered for holidays at a later stage. The issue, however, remained unresolved.
The unions say that in 2022, the government and the IBA agreed to discuss extending daily working hours from Monday to Friday so that the remaining Saturdays could be declared holidays. After discussions, it was agreed in December 2023 that daily working hours would be increased by 40 minutes on weekdays, and all Saturdays would be holidays. While this proposal was recommended to the government, UFBU says the approval has been pending for nearly two years.
A conciliation meeting held by the chief labour commissioner on 22nd January and 23 January 2026 in New Delhi also failed to break the deadlock. Finance ministry officials attended the meeting but did not give a positive response, prompting the unions to go ahead with the strike.
“Since there was no positive outcome and the government did not agree to our demand, this strike has been forced on us. Bank employees and officers are highly aggrieved that they alone are being discriminated against,” says CH Venkatachalam, general secretary of the All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA), a constituent of the UFBU.
UFBU has argued that several other financial and government institutions already follow a five-day work week. Offices of Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) and General Insurance Corporation (GIC) operate from Monday to Friday, as do Central and state government offices. Stock exchanges, money markets and foreign exchange markets are also closed on Saturdays and Sundays.
The unions say declaring all Saturdays as holidays for banks, along with longer weekday hours, would not cause major inconvenience to customers, particularly given the widespread availability of digital banking channels.
SBI, in a regulatory filing, says it made arrangements to ensure normal functioning during the strike but cautioned that services could still be affected. “While the Bank has made necessary arrangements to ensure normal functioning in its branches and offices on the day of strike, it is likely that work in the bank may be impacted by the strike,” the lender says.
UFBU has appealed to the public to bear with the inconvenience caused by the strike, reiterating that the agitation is aimed at securing long-pending demands agreed upon in previous settlements. The unions have warned that further protest programmes could follow if the government continues to delay formal approval for the five-day work week in the banking sector.
