Nearly 45,000 employees of the associate banks of the State Bank of India will go on a two-day strike from July 12 against the proposed merger of their banks with the SBI.

The State Sector Bank Employees’ Association (SSBEA) general secretary, K.S. Krishnan, told reporters here today that the employees from nearly 6,700 branches will participate in the strike. “The merger will hit business,” he said.

The total business of these banks stood at Rs. 9,00,000 crores with an operative profit of Rs, 10,500 crores as on March 2016, he added.

“The merger is to make SBI a very big bank. It will benefit corporates and big companies. Such big banks have collapsed in the U.S. If the merger happens, customers will feel the pinch and face hardship. Even a single transaction will take hours,” Krishnan claimed.

According to him, even the governments in Kerala, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Telengana and Punjab that have stakes in the banks have raised concern in this matter. Stating that there will be no recruitment for five years, he said delinking of associate banks from SBI would ensure independence, functional autonomy, growth and progress.

The managements of the associate banks, including the State Bank of Mysore and State Bank of Hyderabad, have given nod for the merger at a meeting on May 17.