Excelsior Correspondent
— Excelsior/Shakeel
SRINAGAR, Mar 23: The contractual employees of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) today staged a massive protest in city centre here demanding regularisation of their services and threatened of State-wide stir if Government does not meet their demands.
Scores of employees assembled at Pratap Park in Lal Chowk and protested against “government’s lack of clear cut policy” for contractual MGNREGA employees. They included programme officers, management information system operators, technical assistants and Gram Rozgar Sahayaks working under Government’s MGNREGA programme.
The protesters said they have been holding such protests for past many years to seek regularisation of their jobs but the State government was not ready to pay heed to their demands. “Government has always betrayed but this time we have decided to keep protesting till the time our demands are not met. If the government does not do anything this time, we will intensify our protest in the coming days and will launch state-wide protests,” a protestor said.
The protesters demanded that government should frame a job policy for their regularisation and should absorb them in newly created Community Development Blocks. “Nearly 177 blocks were recently created by the government and we are working round the clock to make them successful but the government is overlooking their role,” a protestor said.
The protesters said that Minister for Rural Development and Panchayat Raj, Abdul Haq Khan, recently promised them redressal of their pending demands but alleged that government has failed deliver on their promises. They also said No TA, CA and border allowance are paid to any employee except programme officers and the statement of the minister are wrong.
Follow our WhatsApp channel