ISLAMABAD, May 8: the acting president of the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz), Makhdoom Javed Hashmi, has asked the State Bank of Pakistan to protect the rights of its employees and ensure a healthy working environment.

This was stated by Mr Hashmi while talking to a delegation of the SBP employees which called on him on Thursday, said a press release.

The delegation informed him that the SBP had amended its 1956 Act under the LFO to establish a subsidiary organization, and shifted a sizable staff to it. At that time the bank authorities had promised that the set-up would not be separated from the bank, but they took the reverse stance by disowning the subsidiary organization when the case was taken up by the National Industrial Relation Commission, they claimed.

The delegation urged the PML-N leader to take up the issue at the government-opposition committee currently discussing the LFO, as hundreds of bank employees would lose their genuine rights if their job status was changed.