SBI Computerization Fiasco

There is no better example to public sector mismanagement than the story of State Bank of India' s (SBI) computerization. SBI staff have already held strikes against this 'Core Banking' solution. At that point many have criticized them over being not adaptive to technology or worried about serving customers better. But more interactions with the software and staff at the bank makes me think the decision to use this software (Bancslink) for SBI's computerization was either foolish or, more likely, driven by palm-greasing middlemen.
While Indian companies have world-class banking software like Finnacle or Flexcube, our biggest bank has decided to go with a software, the search of whose name hardly elicits a page of results in Google! Added to that the implementation has been tardy, and staff training inadequate. Probably someone is eating taxpayer money by giving SBI customers and staff a raw deal.
If this is how India' s largest bank treats its customers, and taxpayers, then where are we heading? Can the bank's management explain its decision to use this software and its implementation strategy publicly? I think there should be some such mechanism to hold public sector babus and corrupt politicians accountable.
However, the bank's current ills are not completely due to the software alone. Even if it had been some better software product, the staff would have been extremely unresponsive to adapting it. Now, bank unions (some of the strongest in the country) can give you any number of reasons for this.
But we should not forget that such computerization is nothing new. Many other countries have tread this path before India. If they, notably Europe and the USA, could do this why cannot we?
The answer lies in the pampered position our public sector employees have enjoyed for decades.
The will to learn and adapt was there in Europe and elsewhere as the employees knew if they did not master this monster called computer, they would be rendered jobless. That fear, sadly, is missing among Indian public sector employees. The result: a lot of taxpayer money is being wasted on people who care two hoots about the general public or customers.
In a country where there are millions of able and competent youngsters who can do the job better, cheaper, and more importantly, bring in a better work ethic to government offices, banks, and other such places, this attitude is criminal.
Isn't SBI and its staff answerable to the people?