Punjab ministerial staff burn govt’s effigy

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, February 18

The Bathinda unit of the Punjab state ministerial service union took out a protest march on the second day against the Punjab Government here on Tuesday. They also burnt an effigy of the state government and raised slogans against Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal.

The protest was headed by district president of the union Kewal Bansal and general secretary Baldev Singh. Punjab State Ministerial Union state president Megh Singh Sidhu was present in the protest.

Employees of various government departments, including DC office, Treasury, Excise and Taxation, DFSC, Irrigation, Health, Social Security, PWD, ITI, Agriculture, Water Supply and Sanitation, Education, PWD and Mandi Board, participated in the protest.

They said the state government had accepted their many demands ahead of the Lok Sabha elections on the day the code of conduct came into effect on March 10, 2019, and had assured them that after the code of conduct was lifted, their demands would be implemented. But it seemed that the government had made false promises to employees just to get votes as till date the government had not implemented any of their demands.

They warned that if their demands were not fulfilled in the coming days, then on February 24, they would hold a big rally in Mohali against the state government.

The union has been continuously staging a protest demanding salaries on time, implementation of equal pay for equal work, withdrawal of move to levy Rs 200 as development tax, implementation of the cashless health scheme, probation period to be treated as qualifying service, regularisation of the services of contractual employees and implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission recommendations and restoration of the old-pension scheme for those recruited after 2004.

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