Former Minister Harak Singh Rawat visited the protest site near parade ground on Tuesday and extended support to the agitating contractual workers of Uttarakhand Purva Sainik Kalyan Nigam limited (UPNl). Rawat, who was among the nine Congress MlAs who rebelled against the Harish Rawat Government told the gathering that it appears that the State Government, is harassing the contractual workers in order to settle scores with him. He said that the Government should understand that he was a Minister entrusted the department of UPNl and terming all the workers as his supporters is wrong. Rawat said that the demands of the contractual workers are justified and expressed his total support for their cause. It is worth mentioning here that it was Harak Singh Rawat who in capacity of Minister of UPNl had stated on floor of state assembly on September 29, 2014 that no UPNl worker would be removed.
Meanwhile the strike of the UPNl workers entered ninth day on Tuesday. Under the banner of Federation of contractual UPNl workers more than 18,000 workers deployed in different departments of State Government are on path of confrontation with the state government.
The general secretary of the federation, Mahesh Bhatt said that the workers are sitting on a relay hunger strike at the protest site and if the government fails to heed to their demands then the federation would start a fast unto death in which large number of workers would participate. He alleged that more than 800 workers have been removed in recent past and demanded that their services should immediately be reinstated. The federation is demanding that the services of the contractual workers should be regularized and no worker should be removed. They are also demanding increase in their salaries.
The members of the Youth wing of the Aam Aadami Party (AAP) shouted slogans against the former minister Harak Singh Rawat when he arrived at the protest site to extend support to the UPNl workers.
The agitated members of the wing carried placards and shouted slogans against the BJP leader who was with Congress recently and blamed him for removal of many contractual workers during his tenure as minister of the department.
The Youth wing of AAP is demanding that the state government should fill the 41600 backlog posts in various government departments with the candidates of SC, ST and Backward Castes.