By Salaar Khan
Srinagar: In a bid to open fierce competition with its rival Jammu and Kashmir Bank, the HDFC bank has strongly instructed its employees to perform or submit resignations.
Mounting extra pressure, the bank asked its 12 managers to submit resignation in advance so that if they failed to meet the target given to them by the bank, they should be automatically terminated after two months of the deadline.
It happened despite the HDFC bank is expanding and generating good business. Recently it opened its 74th branch in the state as part of its expansion plan.
The threat was issued to the HDFC employees during a business review meeting conducted by the bank at the business school of Jammu University’s MBA department.
The head of bank’s JK circle Zubair Iqbal was also present on the occasion including the six HDFC cluster heads for the state .
Human Resources head Sajad Ali was also present in the meeting besides all HDFC managers working in the state.
During the meeting, sources HDFC senior officals used abusive and unparlaimentary language so as to pull the managers heading the branches in Jammu and Kashmir to “do more” with limited manpower.
“Shouts and the abuses between the ban employees and their heads forced a fourth class worker of the MBA school to confess that he was doing a better job than the bank heads and mangers. He could not reconcile with the fact that a meeting can turn into a fish market,” sources said.
During the meeting the heads of HDFC asked the cluster heads that a manager should perform the work of two manager or else show him the door.
“It means if 12 managers are working in the same number of banks, they should be reduced to six,” sources said.
Sources said the managers were also asked to submit their resignations from Monday onwards so as to press them for more work.
“The top officals said in case the managers failed to uplift the business and meet the targets, they will consider their resignations. They gave the managers a deadline of two months to uplift the business. The managers termed it sheer blackmailing as they said the HDFC bank was doing well and expanding. The higher officials want them to double the business so as to squeeze the JK banks market.”
As the bank officials demanded resignations by Monday, a bank manager who works at HDFC’s Kupwara branch, Rayees Qureshi, fainted and was taken to the medicentre hospital Jammu for treatment.
“He works under the HDFC cluster head Showket Nehvi,” sources said.
“Nehvi is the same man under whose supervision a girl from Sopore committed suicide alleging he was pressurizing her to get more business”.
Last year a sopore girl, working with the HDFC bank, committed suicide. In her suicide note she said she was ending her life since their cluster head Nehvi was pressurizing her all the time to get more business.
“Later Nehvi was reinstated after a dubious inquiry was conducted by the bank, and he was exonerated,” sources said.
The sources also said the HDFC managers were highly upset with the bank as they Human resource manager was also asked to attend the meeting, which is against the ethics of the bank.
“The job of human resource manager is to safeguard the jobs, not to be part of a gang to cut the jobs by resorting to blackmailing,” sources said.
“All of the managers of HDFC bank are highly upset and unnerved with the bank decision. They have left their jobs at JK bank to work at HDFC. But, it seems it was a bad decision for them”.
In response to the story, HDFC bank stated that the bank is an equal opportunities employer and doesn’t operate in a manner as revealed by the Kashmir Press story.
“The Bank has a system in place that believes in fostering a culture driven by meritocracy and equal opportunity.
“The Bank conducts regular performance reviews and evaluations, which you will agree is part of a process for any corporate. Unfortunate that a news organisation of your repute didn’t reach out to us to seek our comments before publishing the story,” the bank stated.