MSRTC staff calls off strike; state suffers `33 cr loss in just 2 days
The employees of the MSRTC have called off the strike after they got the assurance from the Transport Minister, Diwakar Raote, that the wages has been increased. However, before calling off the strike, the confused employees demanded that they should be informed about their revised salary.
Diwakar Raote said recently the corporation had announced a salary increase of Rs 4,849 crore for the ST employees. But in the workplace, there has been a lot of confusion about the increament.
“It is necessary to know how much of their pay increase. All the employees have been given a good salary hike and urged them to withdraw their illegal calls and immediately get them working,” added Raote.
Raote further added that they will reconsider few cases of action taken against protestors in the past two days. If it is serious offence, we will not pardon these workers. The buses will start operations from Saturday night.
The strike continued for more than 48 hours which in result corporation had to suffer a loss of Rs 33 crore.
As per the circular issued by the Maharashtra State Transport Corporation, they have suffered an estimated loss of Rs 33 crore in the past two days due to ongoing strike called by the employees.
A senior official said a total of 24,852 bus trips were cancelled due to the strike from various ST stands including Mumbai.
MSRTC official said only 30 per cent of the buses have been left out of 350 ST depots and only 25 depots were in full capacity. At 145 depots, partial transportation was in progress whereas there were no buses at 80 depots. As many as 35,239 ST bus journeys were expected till 4:00 pm but the strike only let 10,397 journeys. A total of 24,852 journeys did not happen.
However on June 1, ST had announced the increment in salary on the occasion of 70th anniversary of the transport utility.
There were no disruptions until the midnight of Thursday when the ST employees declared their strike. After which, many employees stopped buses, pelted stones, and there was a violent turn to the strike.
Meanwhile, 19 stone pelting incident on Shiv Shahi buses was reported across the state.
“The Shiv Shahi buses are damaged due to which we have also faced a loss of Rs 25 lakhs. No organisation has taken the responsibility for the strike and the source of the strike is still unknown,” said MSRTC official.
The strike has not been called off as the meeting with the corporation is still going on.