Employees of the Uttarakhand Seeds and Terai Development Corporation (USTDC) have reportedly not received their salaries for five months now. The employees held a general meeting at the corporation headquarters and requested the Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat to intervene in the matter and facilitate the disbursal of their salary. It was also decided in the meeting that a delegation of employees would visit Dehradun and meet the chief minister, to request him to facilitate disbursal of their pending salaries and also to improve the condition of the corporation or close it down.
One of the corporation employees, Kamal Srivastav said that the condition of the corporation had deteriorated because it had been producing more quantity of seeds at lesser expenditure and was also unable to sell the same which had resulted in consistent loss. He further opined that some officials had dubious intentions towards the corporation due to which two officers had also been suspended. While the two officers are under suspension, the managing director is on leave. In such a scenario the employees of the corporation are also uncertain about whom to riase their issues with.
It is pertinent to mention here that according to the corporation employees, about 25,000 to 30,000 quintals of seeds of wheat and other crops are used in Uttarakhand annually while about 1,00,000 quintal of seeds produced by the corporation remain unsold. Such seeds are either auctioned off at meagre price or end up rotting away. Along with this, the cost of maintaining a staff of 280 employees means that the corporation has to sustain loss every year. Such is the situation at present that the corporation owes about Rs22 crore in salaries and dues to employees and seed producers respectively.