FAISALABAD, July 2: Over 70 women officials of the First Women Bank, who have been serving in different grades since 1996, have reportedly been terminated during the process of what, the bank management said, restructuring.

Those terminated were working in various parts of the country for the last many years. The bank was established in 1989 with an objective to provide employment to women in the financial sector and credit facilities to them on a soft term basis so that they could run their independent businesses, especially in cottage industries.

Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto launched this institution and allocated huge funds for motivating the women to set up their own industries and business centres. The women were deputed in all branches across the country.

According to policy of the bank, only women can get employment with the bank. But a number of male officers had been inducted in the bank in violation of its basic charter.

The managers of bank branches in Bahawalpur, Rahim Yar Khan, Quetta and Faisalabad are male, who were appointed in the recent past by ignoring the departmental promotions of the eligible women officers serving since 1989.

Insiders revealed that almost all the women officials, who had been sacked, had a service record of seven to eight years. A majority of those women bankers was regularized. However, the appointment letters were issued to them on an ad hoc basis, which was further extended for six months before the expiry date of Dec 31, 2003.

In a surprising move, the top management of the bank removed over 70 female bank officers and officials on the pretext that they were not eligible to be regularized, the insiders said.

They said the bank was extending credit facilities also to industrial concerns, and exporters and importers in violation of rules. The affected employees and consumers of the bank have demanded that president Gen Pervez Musharraf should take notice of the massive termination.