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Volume 18 - Issue 04, Feb. 17 - Mar.
02, 2001 |
BANKING REFORMS
The dark side of the package
V. SRIDHAR
SUHRID SHANKAR
CHATTOPADHYAY
FROM the outside,
the VRS package looks an attractive one-time settlement. However, union
activists have a different tale, one of woes that befell those who opted for
the VRS - either under duress from the management or because of failing health,
or just because they were tempted by it.
The fundamental
difference between a relatively small salary and the illusion of a hefty VRS
package is that the former is a flow and the latter a stock. A salary, however meagre, comes regularly whereas a fixed amount gets
depleted by current expenditures on the necessities of life. Normally, salaries
in organised industry are inflation-indexed; even
partial indexation provides some cover from the ravages of inflation. A Rs.6-8 lakh package may look
attractive - until it is wiped out by a major ailment or disease that such a
person is vulnerable to at the age at which he/she opts for the VRS.
To add to these
daily uncertainties of life, it is virtually impossible for a worker to
identify one area in the financial market where he can park on a long-term
basis his life-long savings earned in the form of VRS compensation. The stock
markets have played truant, finance companies have often gone bust and mutual
funds do not always deliver decent returns month after month while also
offering security.
Union activists
also point to the psychological scars that torment people in the
post-retirement phase. The activity and camaraderie of the workplace is lost
for them; the sense of social acceptance, which comes with a job, also
diminishes.
Tushar Das, general secretary of
the Standard & Chartered (now Standard Chartered Grindlays)
All India Employees Union, says that many employees who opted for VRS from the
bank in 1999 now live under strained circumstances. The VRS was thrust on the
employees by the management. They were told that they could either opt for the
VRS or leave with three months' salary. Those who succumbed to the pressure are
now suffering. They have no fixed income and have their children to be educated
and many of them have daughters to be married off. "Many of them often
come to the union office, meet former colleagues and take some load off their
chest," said Das.
Pradeep Mukherjee of Chinsurah, formerly a clerk in Standard & Chartered, joined
a travel agency after opting for the VRS. Today he is selling soaps and oil
door to door. Santanu Ray Chowdhuri,
a former clerk in the same bank, found employment in a small private company.
However, what he earns now is a pittance compared to what he used to in
Standard & Chartered. After being forced to take the VRS, two men from
Mumbai, who were class IV staff in the bank, took to crime for survival.
The list of such
VRS-affected people is long. According to Tushar Das, out of the 300 employees who accepted the VRS, only
nine or 10 have managed to remain on an even keel.