UDF to wind up Kerala Bank if elected to power: Chennithala

Thiruvananthapuram: Making its position clear, Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala on Tuesday categorically said 'if elected to power in the upcoming Assembly polls, the Congress-led UDF will wind up the operations of the Kerala Bank'. The bank was formally launched by the Chief Minister in a function held in the state capital in 2019. The Pinarayi Vijayan-led Left government had made it very clear right from the time they assumed office in 2016 that the Kerala Bank would be formed by merging 14 district cooperative banks with the Kerala State Cooperative Bank (KSCB) and it would be named as Kerala Bank. Earlier, the Cooperative banks in the state had a three-tier structure with the primary banks at the grassroots level which were attached to the respective district banks and the apex body was the KSCB. This changed after Vijayan launched the Kerala Bank. Speaking to the media at his hometown in Alappuzha as part of his statewide yatra, Chennithala said the present Kerala Bank was an illegal entity and even the Reserve Bank of India had made its position clear on it.

"The once fledgling cooperative banking sector in the State has been destroyed in the name of the Kerala Bank. If we return to power, the Kerala Bank will be wound up," said Chennithala.

Chennithala's statement comes a day after the Kerala High Court acting on a petition from a Kottayam resident stating that the Kerala government was on the sly trying to regularise the appointment of 1,850 temporary employees working in various posts in Kerala Bank, stayed this move of the Pinarayi Vijayan government.