30 sanitation workers booked for assaulting MC officials, PWD staff

As many as 30 sanitation workers have been booked by the Civil Lines police for allegedly attacking Municipal Corporation (MC) officials and PWD staff.

The Civil Lines police have registered two separate cases against the sanitation employees – one was registered on the complaint of MC employees and the other was registered on the complaint of PWD officials. "Two separate cases have been registered against sanitation employees at the Civil Lines police station. Probe into the matter is underway. The police are inquiring into the reasons and what actually happened," said Rajdeep Mor, ACP, Sonepat City.

Meanwhile, on Saturday, the sanitation employees continued their protest – which began on Thursday over their long-pending demands -- but the police didn’t allow the protesting employees to stage their dharna at the MC office gate and told them to continue their protest in the park at the rear of the office.

Mukesh Tank, president, Theka Safai Karamchari Ekta Manch, said they organised a foot march from Sonepat on September 3 and reached Ambala on September 8 to meet Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini over their demands. But they were stopped by the police at Ambala. A nine-member delegation went to Chandigarh and Bharat Bhushan Bharti, OSD to Chief Minister, held a meeting with them for around two hours.

In a memorandum handed over to him, they said that there was a big scam in EPF and ESI of the contractual sanitation employees. Apart from it, the contract system should be ended and the employees should be appointed either on ‘Palika’ roll or merged into Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Nigam (HKRN), Tank added.

Notably, the new sanitation contract started on September 15 and the sanitation employees began a protest at the MC office from Thursday over their demands. When the Chief Sanitary Inspector, other officials and contractors tried to hold talks with the protesters on Friday, tempers flared up. The sanitation employees allegedly assaulted the officials. As the officials ran to save themselves, the protesters allegedly chased them to the PWD’s Superintending Engineer’s office, broke the glass doors and assaulted a sanitary inspector of the MC. Nishant, a chowkidar of the PWD, was also injured when he tried to shut the doors.

Tank alleged that officials and contractors “misbehaved with women sanitation workers and used casteist slurs,” which triggered anger. He claimed that the new agency had “reduced both the number of employees and salaries” leading to refusal by workers to join under the new terms.

Following the violence, the PWD and MC officials filed complaints at the Civil Lines police station against the sanitation workers. In turn, the sanitation employees filed their own complaint against officials for misbehaviour and casteist remarks. The Civil Lines police registered two separate cases against the sanitation workers on the complaint of MC officials as well as the PWD officials.

Tank said that they had also given a complaint against MC employees to the police, but the police have not initiated any action against the MC officials so far on their complaint. But the police have registered two cases against the protesting employees.