Banks to give gloves to workers handling cash

Kolkata: All nationalised banks will provide gloves to the employees who are handling cash. The decision was taken at a high-level meeting on Tuesday.

Accordingly, the UCO Bank authorities issued an instruction to the zonal heads on March 17 under the heading 'Immediate precautionary measures to be taken to avoid spread of Coronavirus (COVID-19)'.

The banks will provide face masks to the front line staff who directly interact with people. The banks will also provide hand sanitisers to the employees. The instructions are to be implemented immediately and cannot be withdrawn until further notice.

The bank employees meet hundreds of customers every day and they get no opportunities to put on masks, gloves or use hand sanitisers. It may be recalled that several bank employees who were on duty died during note ban, in a bid to tackle the huge rush of customers.

As those who handle cash cannot leave the work station without completing counting of notes, they cannot go and wash their hands with sanitisers.

Pitam Sengupta, a senior bank official, had uploaded

a write-up containing the

problems faced by bank employees after Coronavirus was declared as a pandemic on social media.

The write-up attracted the attention of thousands of people across the country and finally the bank authorities took the decision and introduced several precautionary measures which are going to be implemented from Thursday.