Paying no heed to the enforcement of ESMA and ‘no work no pay’ rule enforced by Haryana Government, thousands of employees of State power distribution companies on Wednesday began their two-day Statewide strike against the outsourcing in the Power Department even as the State Government claimed that there was no effect of strike and power supply was normal.
Protesting against the hiring of private contractors for the maintenance and operations in 23 subdivisions of the State, the employees sat on dharna and raised slogans against the State Government at various places.
The decision to proceed with the strike came after the talks between the employees unions of Haryana Power Utilities and the State Government had failed to yield result on Monday.
The Joint Action Committee of Haryana power employees unions proceeded on strike late Tuesday night. Around 23,000 employees of Power Department in the State have stopped working, said Committee’s general secretary Subhash lamba.
The State Government remained adamant on its decision of “privatisation” forcing us to go on strike, said he adding that the Government also threatened the employees not to proceed on two-day strike.
lamba said that the matter can be resolved with the intervention of Chief Minister Manohar lal Khattar and if the State Government decided to withdraw the decision of privatisation in 23 sub divisions.
The employees are also demanding filling up of 30,000 vacant posts, inquiry into sharp rise in losses and debt of power distribution companies.
Meanwhile, terming the decision of the employees to go on strike as “unjustified”, Haryana Government on Wednesday claimed that the power supply in the entire State was normal.
Talking to the mediapersons here, Haryana Chief Secretary DS Dhesi said that despite the strike by a section of employees of the power utilities, the consumers are getting 8,000 MW of power by 12 noon as compared to the average supply of 7200 MW in the last one week at the same time.
About 36 per cent of total employees remained absent on Wednesday. The supply, however, was maintained by the officers with the help of remaining employees. All the officers of the department are on duty round the clock. Special emergency teams are working to attend to the complaints promptly, said Dhesi.
When asked about the number of absentees, Dhesi said that the number of absentees is more in districts of Hisar, Gurgaon, Faridabad, Ambala and Kurukshetra. And, two incidents of causing disruption in supply of power have been reported from Hisar and Bahadurgarh, where the supply was restored, he said.
Taking precautionary measures in view of the strike call, prohibitory orders under Section 144 have been imposed at several places, particularly in areas close to the power sub stations in the state.
Haryana Government had already invoked Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) to prevent disruption in power supply due to strike.
As the power sub-stations being the sensitive installations, police has made adequate arrangements for their safety. The police is patrolling the areas of transmission lines so as to protect them from miscreants and anti-social elements, said Additional Chief Secretary, Power, Rajan Gupta.
On taking action against the protesting employees for defying ESMA, Gupta said that in case an employee indulges deliberately in sabotage of power supply, strict action as per law will be taken against such person.
The State Government will adopt “no work, no pay” policy and action will be taken against those employees, if people face any inconvenience due to power disruption in their division, said he.
The Government will review the entire situation and take action against the erring employees accordingly, he added.
Meanwhile, inspections were conducted at various places in the state by senior officials to check the absentees in the Power Department. Directions were also issued to suspend contractual employees at some places as they defied government’s order to remain present in the offices during the period of strike.
The State Government has already issued instructions to the district magistrates and officers in the field to ensure that power supply is not disrupted.
Justifying the decision of privatization, Rajan Gupta said that the State Government has engaged service providers in 23 sub-divisions for undertaking maintenance works on lT system and redressing complaints of the consumers relating to interruption of power supply.
“It is a pilot project and its results would be visible in next three-four months. The power utilities will pay Rs 16 lakh to Rs 20 lakh per subdivision per month to these service providers,” he said.
The decision to engage companies is not intended to adversely affect any employee of the Nigams in any manner. No employee would be affected due to this but rather the decision will further facilitate their functioning, he added.
