Govt blinks, calls workers for talks today
CHANDIGARH: Bowing before the ongoing strike by the civic bodies employees, the Haryana government has again called them for talks on Thursday.
Briefing newspersons here on Wednesday, social justice and empowerment minister Krishan Bedi said chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar had agreed to constitute a committee to further look into the demands of the striking employees.
The issue had come up at an informal meeting of the ministers chaired by Khattar on Wednesday, he said.
Urban local bodies minister Kavita Jain would head the committee. Bedi and cooperation minister Manish Grover would be among the members, besides some top officials.
The committee has convened a meeting with the leaders of employees on Thursday.
The previous meeting, which was held by Khattar with the agitating civic bodies employees’ union leaders exactly a week ago, had failed and the workers’ union had decided to continue strike.
The contractual staff, mainly the sanitation workers, of the local bodies had been on strike since May 9. Their main demands include regularisation of the contractual employees, an end to contract system, same pay for same work and provision of other service benefits to them. The government had decided to enhance the sanitation workers’ allowance from Rs 300 to Rs 1,000. It was also decided that no new outsourcing contracts for providing employees, including sanitation workers or sewer men, would be done in future. Also, the provident fund and employees’ state insurance would be directly deposited by the urban local bodies in the accounts of the individual employees as was demanded by workers.
Notably, the contractual staff of the all the 30,000 employees of 87 civic bodies (61 municipal committees, 16 municipal councils and 10 municipal corporations) in the state are on strike.
The sanitation staff had also dumped garbage in front of government offices and other public places in different parts of the state, including Rohtak, Karnal and Hisar.
KHATTAR FORMS A COMMITTEE TO LOOK INTO THE DEMANDS OF THE STRIKING EMPLOYEES