Outsourced municipal employees staging a semi-naked protest for their demands, at Dharna Chowk in Vijayawada on Wednesday.
| Photo Credit: K.V.S Giri
Outsourced municipal workers’ leaders have announced that they will temporarily stall the Statewide indefinite strike, which continued for 16 days from December 26, as their talks with Special Chief Secretary, Municipal Administration and Urban Developement, Y. Srilakshmi made some headway on Wednesday.
A.P. Municipal Employees and Workers’ Federation State general secretary K. Umamaheswara Rao said while their demand for regularisation of services had not been met, the State government had agreed to extend the Occupational Health Allowance (OHA) of ₹6,000 to those who were hitherto not getting it.
“The government’s decision to merge the basic pay and the allowance is commendable, but we demand that an annual bonus of monthly pay be given to workers. If that is not possible, then at least our monthly honorarium should be enhanced by ₹2,000-₹3,000,” Mr. Umamaheswara Rao said.
Until now, only sweepers (sanitation department) used to get the health allowance. Now, the same would be extended to all categories of workers of the Underground Drainage (UGD), including those who enter the drain, garbage vehicle drivers and cleaners who accompany them. A GO was also issued to this effect on January 1. However, the workers raised a concern when park workers were not mentioned in the GO.
Mr. Umamaheswara Rao said the government would form a nine-member committee to study the work conditions of those who were left out of the list of workers getting allowances. The committee would decide who else should be added to the list.
He said discussions were under way about provision of basic pay as per GO RT Ms. 30 (January 19, 2018) to eight categories of the Engineering department workers and that the issue is pending with the Finance Department.
Regarding their demand for enhanced pay for skilled workers (in comparison to semi skilled and unskilled), the government had said there would be a system in place through which skilled works can get training, certificates and be paid accordingly.
Jyoti Basu, a member of the federation affiliated to the CITU, said the government had also promised to them retirement benefits of ₹50,000 and increase in ex gratia from ₹5 lakh to ₹7 lakh in cases of accidental deaths of workers.
He said the State government had assured them that all GOs would be issued immediately after the festival, and that the nine-member committee would also be formed after the festival. “If the same is not done, we will resume our strike again. We have only temporaraily stalled it,” he said.