Irrespective of the assurance given by the State Chief Minister Harish Rawat that no contractual workers of Uttarakhand Purva Sainik Kalyan Nigam (UPSKN) would be removed, the striking workers are adamant that they would take back the stir only when the State Government releases Government Order (GO).
In meeting with the representatives of the federation of contractual UPNl workers at Congress party state unit on Thursday the CM had assured that no worker would be removed and those removed in recent past would be reemployed. However, this declaration of Rawat has failed to break ice with the federation which is on strike from June 27.
The General Secretary of the federation Mahesh Bhatt said, “We have listened and believed on many assurances in the past given by the State Government but in practice nothing happened. Now we will only get satisfied by the GO and nothing else.” He informed that a delegation of the federation met Cabinet Minister Pritam Singh on Friday and he expressed full support for the demands of the UPNl workers. Bhatt added that the members of the federation would meet state revenue minister Yashpal Arya on Saturday.
To press for their demand the members of the federation are also sitting on a relay hunger strike at Protest site where they are camping from last many days. There are more than 18000 contractual workers appointed in different Government department by the agency of UPNl.
These workers got annoyed when the State Government recently set up a sub-ordinate services selection commission and started recruitment for the posts on which the contractual workers are deployed for last many years.
The federation is of the view that this step of Government is against the repeated assurances given by the State Government in the past that no contractual workers would be removed. The federation is demanding that the State Government should make their services permanent. The other demands of the workers are that their salary should be increased and they should not be removed.