State Banks' Staff Union (SBSU) has demanded swift action to fill positions of clerks and messengers falling vacant in the Kerala Circle.

Mr A. Jayakumar, General Secretary of the SBSU, said the bank has not recruited clerical staff after 2010.

Recruitment of messengers in the subordinate cadre has been frozen for 15 years now. The staff shortage could seriously affect the delivery of services, Mr Jayakumar said.

The Kerala Circle came into existence in 2000 when it had 233 branches. It had clerical staff strength of 2,916 and subordinate staff of 1,339. The business figure as on December 31 was Rs 5,542 crore.

The bank has since grown to 440 offices, including 387 branches; two administrative offices at Thiruvananthapuram and Ernakulam besides the Local Head Office; 10 regional business offices with marketing divisions and around 25 cells. The business figure gas since galloped to Rs 35,090 crore as on December 31, 2011.

But the number of clerical staff has grown only to 3,224. Most of the newly opened branches are working with no more than two clerical staff and no messengers.

The bank had decided to post 1,415 staff over the last three years and had issued orders to successful candidates, but only 945 have joined.

The union had demanded that new postings be made from a waitlist which bank has refused to do on technical grounds. Thus there is a shortfall of 470 in the number of candidates recruited.