New Delhi: Bank are likely to remain out of reach for seven days out of the next nine days — starting from March 28 — due to holidays and annual closing of accounts.
“The holiday season, coupled with annual closing of accounts for the financial year from March 28 right through the next week till April 5 will result in a lot disruption in financial transactions in the stock markets, normal commercial deals, export shipments, import consignments and salary payments,” said industry chamber Assocham.
Apart from banks, a string of holidays would also affect operations at the cargo stations of the airlines and customs at the port.
March 28 is holiday on account of Ram Nawami followed by Sunday. Then the banks will open on March 30 for a day and would be out of reach for the public on March 31 and April 1 due to annual closing. On April 2, the banks along with government offices remain shut because of Mahavir Jayanti, followed by Good Friday on April 3. On the following day, banks will work for a couple of hours on Saturday, followed by Sunday on April 5.
“We would urge RBI to step in and advise the banks to make some arrangements. With the government being the majority owners of the public sector banks, the finance ministry should also prevail on the bank managements to avoid this kind of huge customer inconvenience and widespread disruption to the business environment,’’ said Assocham secretary general D.S. Rawat.
While the ATMs would remain operational, there is a different kind of problem, which is that “a large number of ATMs do not work properly and they are at best doing only cash vending jobs. What about rest of banking transactions like cheque clearances, salary disbursals? The week of holidays from March 28 is going to be difficult,” the industry body said.
