Chandigarh Mayor to take up sanitation workers protest

Chandigarh Mayor Asha Jaswal. (Source: Jasbir Malhi)

Chandigarh Mayor Asha Jaswal would be holding a meeting with the councillors and officials on the issue of sanitation workers on Monday. The mayor said sanitation workers had been calling strikes “despite being asked to work”. The councillors would be formulating some guidelines for the sanitation workers on Monday and to deliberate upon their demands. The Municipal Corporation had written to the UT Administration to initiate legal action against 25 regular sanitation workers for staging protests.

The sanitation workers have been protesting due to their pending demands wherein they have been demanding jobs for dependents of deceased workers, filling up of 532 vacant posts, regularisation of 126 daily wage employees and bringing those working under contractors under the MC. Last week, the agitators stalled garbage trucks from going towards the dumping ground.

It was only after the local police arrived and conveyed to the protesters that a meeting with the home secretary over their pending demands has been fixed that the protest was called off. The mayor said they couldn’t allow the sanitation workers to go on strike frequently as residents had to suffer.