With the last week of August bringing festivals like Onam and Raksha Bandhan, there is a lot of buzz about bank holidays among the public. Banks, including SBI, PNB, ICICI, HDFC, and other public and private lenders follow the Reserve Bank of India's bank holiday calendar.
The calendar accounts for national holidays, regional festivals, and second and fourth Saturday along with all Sundays.
The week ahead brings a further round of closures. Regional festival holidays fall on three separate days between August 24 to 30, meaning branches in several states will be shut for up to four days this week, according to the RBI's calendar. Normal service resumes on Saturday, August 29, since it falls on the fifth Saturday of the month, a day on which banks stay open.
Banks will operate for three to four days this week, with the remaining days affected as follows:
Tuesday, August 25 - Branches in Kerala and Andhra Pradesh will be closed for Milad-un-Nabi (also called Milad-i-Sherif, marking the birth of Prophet Muhammad) and the first day of Onam.
Wednesday, August 26 - A wider set of states, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Telangana, Manipur, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Delhi, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, will observe closures for Id-e-Milad or Bara Wafat, alongside Thiruvonam celebrations.
Friday, August 28 - Branches in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala and Himachal Pradesh will shut for Raksha Bandhan.
Sunday, August 30 - Regular weekend closure.
Banking will be less disrupted next week, with branches open for five to six days. The one exception falls on Friday, September 4, when banks in a long list of cities, including Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chandigarh, Chennai, Dehradun, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Patna and Thiruvananthapuram, among others, will close for Janmashtami, marking Krishna Jayanthi.
Branch timings vary between institutions and between public and private sector banks, but most begin public-facing operations at 10am and close counters to walk-in customers by 4pm on working days.
Closures apply only to physical branch services. Online and mobile banking platforms continue to run around the clock, including on holidays and weekends. Services such as NEFT, RTGS, internet banking, mobile banking, UPI and ATMs remain fully operational, allowing customers to complete essential transactions without interruption regardless of branch closures.
