While in the brink of great recession (economic crisis) throughout the world the 2nd World War started from 1939 and ended in 1945 at the cost of severe devastation in many countries, India under British Rule, also faced acute financial crisis. A good number of small and medium sized banks went to liquidation. At that juncture, The Coomilla Union Bank Ltd., The Bengal Central Bank Ltd., The Coomilla Banking Corporation Ltd. and The Hooghly Bank Ltd. merged themselves for their existence and formed The UNITED BANK OF INDIA Ltd. (UBI Ltd.) on 18th December, 1950. The Bank's Head Office being located in Kolkata became the focal point of all its activities in certain states specially in Eastern and North Eastern part of India. The Government of India nationalized UBI Ltd. along with other 13 major Indian scheduled commercial banks on 19th July, 1969. Subsequently other Banks namely, Cuttack Bank Limited, Tezpur Industrial Bank Limited, Hindusthan Mercantile Bank Limited and Narang Bank of India Limited were merged with the Bank.
At the time of formation of UBI Ltd., the then leadership of 4 Unions/ Associations of aforesaid 4 banks realized the necessity of formation of one union and accordingly, the United Bank of India Employees' Association (UBIEA) was formed on 25th December, 1950 which was affiliated to All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA). At the time of formation, virtually all the employees irrespective of cadres became the members of UBIEA.
Just after formation of UBI, severe attacks were lodged against the employees. The management decided to retrench about 800 employees or else the employees were to accept salary of "B" class Banks. The then union vehemently opposed and a serious struggle was launched against bank management which ended in a remarkable victory of realizing 'A' class bank salary that too without any retrenchment.
But in course of time, the then leadership began to drift away from the scheduled object and principle of the Association. The democratic functioning, the lifeline of the organization, was being diluted and dismantled. Discontentment amongst rank and file seriously cropped up. The All India Conference in 1972 held at Kolkata witnessed a serious spark so as to be the evidence of congregated grievances of the larger section of delegates. The fabrics of the organization began to crack. Later on, a section of aggrieved members formed UBISKS as an award staff union.
At that crucial time, Com. Keshab Sen and Com. Chitta Ranjan Banerjee, echoing a countable section of employees were raising their voices for the cause of the employees and were stressing on unification of the employees demanding democratic functioning within the organization. Without paying heed to their just demands, the then leadership became more undemocratic and vindictive. It flared up during emergency when 4 employees namely Com. Ardhendu Dutta, Com. Pradip Dutta, Com. Aniruddha Munshi and Com. Manojit Chakraborty were dismissed from service without any enquiry proceedings violating the provision 522(A) of Sastri Award. The leadership instead of taking up the issue rather compromised with the management. Without having no other alternative, Com. Keshab Sen, Com. Chitta Ranjan Banerjee and others called upon employees to rise for campaign movement demanding reinstatement of 4 comrades. The campaign movement turned to be a popular active movement.
Facing the tides of agitations, the management at last compelled to reinstate 4 comrades on 26.09.1979. That was an unprecedented victory of employees of their own.
In the meantime, the all India Conference fell due which was pending for years together. Under sustained persuasions, it was decided by the leadership to hold conference on 12th January, 1980 at Barabati Stadium in Cuttack (Orissa). As apprehended, the leadership with a preconceived idea formed Presidium, conducted the conference in a highly undemocratic manner. List of elected delegates was not supplied. The demand for 'election by secret ballot' was denied. Some protestant leaders were manhandled. In such situation, a notable section of delegates including Com. Chitta Ranjan Banerjee, Com. Arjun Prasad, Com. Subimal Nag and others were forced to leave conference venue at the intervention of unruly outsiders. The panels of Office Bearers and Central Committee members were passed unilaterally by so called 'raising of hands'. The delegates, who left conference hall, assembled at Cuttack Club and formed a Coordination Forum under the leadership of Com. Chitta Ranjan Banerjee. Com. Amitava Nandy, Com. Bani Chattopadhyay and other leading comrades were the vanguards of the Forum.
In spite of all those happenings, the Coordination Forum did not call for formation of another Union; on the contrary they submitted a demand for holding a Special Conference only on one agenda of 'election of office bearers and central committee members by secret ballot'. But that was also rigidly denied.
Under such compulsion imposed upon, the Forum took a historic decision to form UNITED BANK OF INDIA EMPLOYEES' UNION (UBIEU) and it was registered with no 14874 on 31st July, 1980 by a preparatory committee with Com. Sunirmal Sengupta as General Secretary. In this context, a General Meeting of employees was held in Thyagaraja Hall, Kolkata on 10th and 11th January, 1981 with an unprecedented mammoth rally and procession of employees coming from nook and corners of our country. This always stands as a remarkable memory of struggling bank employees particularly in our Bank. The General Meeting adopted a powerful Constitution which ideally deserves for a Trade Union in true sense. The General Meeting elected unanimously the central leadership headed by Com. Keshab Sen and Com Chitta Ranjan Banerjee as President and General Secretary respectively.
UBIEU being a pioneer organization at the time of formation of BANK EMPLOYEES' FEDERATION OF INDIA (BEFI) at national level obviously got affiliation to BEFI.
