Secretariat services employees started wearing black badges at work to protest the government’s indifference towards their demands, will chalk out further strategies after the Monsoon session.
Even as the members of the State Secretariat Services Confederation today started wearing black badges while at work in protest against the state government’s indifference towards their demand for releasing Dearness Allowance and pending arrears, the confrontation is likely to increase with the government choosing to serve Memo to the employee leaders for violating conduct rules.
The Memo, which seeks an explanation from the State Secretariat Services employee leaders within 15 days for criticising the government schemes and policies in their speeches, has not perturbed the employee leaders.
The Confederation, however, said it had never happened in the last three and a half decades of their experience. They said the Secretariat employees will work peacefully while wearing black badges till the ongoing Monsoon Session (which ends on September 9). The Confederation would conduct a General House in case the government did not call them or address their issues even after this.
“We have only conducted General Houses to press for our rights, which we can do. We do not fear such notices,” said the Confederation leaders. They said they have every right to raise their genuine issues related to their service.
Talking to media persons later, Leader of Opposition, Jai Ram Thakur criticised the Congress government for serving notice to the employee leaders of the state Secretariat. “It is a double standard. The Congress government calls itself the employee-friendly government. Then why has it served notices to them for raising their genuine demands,” Thakur said.
The former BJP CM said the Congress government should address the issues of employees and release their due Dearness Allowance and arrears. He said the previous BJP government had been giving the due of employees on time, but this Congress government has not conceded to their genuine demands and in just 19 months of rule it is facing protests from different quarters.
It is pertinent to mention that the State Secretariat Employees Confederation had held two General House meetings in the Secretariat complex, requesting the government to call them for their demands. The President of the Confederation, Sanjeev Sharma and other leaders had alleged that the state government was crying about the financial crunch but was not curtailing wasteful expenditure on repairs of new houses.
The employee leaders had targeted Technical Education Minister, Rajesh Dharmani for his statement that the employees may lose their existing ‘benefits’ also if they don’t support the government. The employee leaders had also exposed the expenditure being incurred on the phone allowances and cars of the bureaucrats, which they alleged were being misused for their families.
The Secretariat Services Confederation had requested the state government to call them for talks to sort out the matter of demands, but the government instead chose to call some other employee leaders from the state, while ignoring this Confederation.
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