Demanding Government status for the Programme Assistants working under the State Women and Child Development Department, the All Odisha Programme Assistants’ Association staged a demonstration before the Assembly here on Friday.
Their demands included status as that of Government employees, increment of minimum salary to Rs 9,300 and implementation of a specific job chart. At a meeting held under the chairmanship of association president Basant Kumar Sahoo, the Programme Assistants discussed about their various problems including irregular payment of their salary fixed by the State Government and provision of salary less than the fixed ones, etc.
They alleged that though a total of 368 Programme Assistants at all District Welfare Offices and Integrated Child Development Projects have been executing various welfare schemes of the Government, the departmental authorities are not taking any steps to solve their problems. A five-member team of the association submitted a memorandum to CM Naveen Patnaik.