Teachers, govt unions hold Maha rally in Jalandhar

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, March 18

Thousands of employees, under the banner of the Democratic Employees Federation, held a Maha rally at the PUDA ground here today.

They took out a protest march across the bazaars of the district in which ASHA, mid-day meal and the Forest Department workers from across the state participated in a large number.

Besides, many contractual and regular employees from government and government-aided corporations also participated in the rally. Addressing the rally, state president of the federation Bhupinder Singh Waraich and general secretary Germanjit Singh, while condemning the Capt Amarinder Singh government, said an autocratic rule prevailed within the state at present in which the ASHA and mid-day meal workers were being made to work without their due allowances.

They said the forest workers, among others, who had pursued their jobs for the past 25 years, were still working on a contractual basis.

They said employees of corporations, boards, cooperative institutions and other employees who were recruited after January 2004 were devoid of the right to pension. They said the police’s stance regarding the Sixth Pay Commission was not encouraging and the government was silent on the three DA instalments from January 2017 until now.

Speaking at the rally, Amarjit Shastri, Harinder Dosanjh, Jugraj Tallewal, Om Prakash and Paramjit Kaur Mann said due to the prevailing situation, almost akin to a financial emergency in the state, all allowances of the employees had been stopped for the past seven months.

They said salaries of the teachers of the 5178 Union, SSA/RMSA, computer teachers, who had been taking full salaries after being regularised in 2011, Adarsh Model School teachers and mid-day meal managers had been fixed at a mere Rs 10,300 per month and conditions were being imposed for their tenures for the coming three years.

Teachers said rather than keeping their promise of the regularisation of 27,000 teachers in the state, the government had, instead, filed cases against the teachers struggling for their rights in Mohali and Jalandhar. They said the electoral promises of the Congress on the contrary, had claimed that all contractual employees shall be regularised within a month.

Speaking at the rally, various speakers said the mid-day meal, ASHA and part-time workers should be brought under at least the minimum wages scheme and paid at least Rs 8,403, facilitators should be paid at least Rs 18,000, pension scheme should be implemented for the employees who had been recruited after January 2018. Forest workers, water supply workers, 5178 teachers, computer teachers, SSA/RMSA teachers, Adarsh Model School teachers, IIV, STR, EGS, AIE volunteers and education providers should be regularised in their respective departments and the cases filed against them in Ropar, Bathinda, Mohali and Jalandhar should be withdrawn.

They also demanded that the DA instalments from January 2017 to January 2018 be paid, the over one lakh posts of group C and D in government departments be filled with regular posts and rather than providing initial salary for two years, the entire salary should be paid, besides accepting their other demands.

Besides the aforementioned leaders, the rally saw the presence of Nachattar Singh Tarn Taran, Makkhan Singh Faridkot, Jaswinder Singh Jhabelwali, Vikramdev Singh, Prakash Singh Thothiyan and Hardeep Singh Tedpur etc.