No waste lifting in towns for 9 days amid strike

Safai karamcharis of the Municipal Corporation and Committees across various towns, including Nawanshahr, Hoshiarpur and Kapurthala, have been on strike over the past nine days over the government move to privatise door-to-door garbage lifting.

Owing to no lifting of waste from houses and from various dumping sites in the town, the towns wear a dirty look, especially since these are Navratri days and people like to shop. The safai karamcharis have said privatisation of work would render more than two-third staff, which is on contract, jobless.

The shoppers in various markets said the condition of roads was already bad and now that the garbage was piling up along all roadsides, it was not safe to venture out. They have been demanding from the government to sort out the matter at the earliest.

Ex-Congress MLA Angad Saini blamed it on AAP for not ensuring cleanliness and being able to take safai karamcharis into confidence ahead of plans to enter into privatisation mode. AAP halqa incharge Lalit Mohan Pathak said, "The issue is being dealt with from Chandigarh and there is a centralised plan to have privatisation of committees for garbage collection."

The AAP leaders, however, reportedly intervened and urged the safai karamcharis to at least get the roads outside temple and other religious premises cleaned in view of the festive season. Their strike, however, goes on indefinitely.