More than 1,000 officers of the seven subsidiary banks took part in the protest held in front of head office of State Bank of Mysore, on Kempe Gowda Road.

On Monday, staff of all seven banks were on strike. With that, the subsidiary banks had no transaction for two consecutive days. Lakhs of customers had a tough time as ATMs were not functioning either.

A C Chandraprasad, general secretary of Associate Banks’ Officers’ Association, said that the board of SBI has taken a decision which can be detrimental to subsidiary banks. Moreover, the decision is against an amendment to the SBI (Subsidiary banks) Act, which upholds autonomy for subsidiary banks, he added.

He said that the State Bank of India has thought of merging subsidiary banks because it has failed to face the onslaught of private sector banks effectively.

The subsidiary banks have been doing well, and instead of merging the banks the board should take a decision on withdrawing its share from the subsidiary banks, he demanded.

He warned that if the SBI does not backtrack from its decision, the All India Bank Employees Association will hold nation wide strike on January 3.