Regularisation eludes them, contractual employees continue indefinite strike

NOIDA: Their demands going unfulfilled, around 200 irregular employees of the Noida Authority - mostly sanitation workers, water pump operators, supervisors, drivers and computer operators - have been sitting on a protest for the past 17 days.

The contractual workers are demanding that they be regularised and granted benefits like identity cards, provident fund, paid leave, etc.


The demand to regularise 4500 irregular employees - which have been provided to the Authority by the contractors, which are paid 2.5 per cent of the total project amount as commission - was first raised in 2011, but hasn't been met so far.

The employees are getting a monthly salary of Rs 14,055 each without any other benefits.


Refusing to join work, the workers who are sitting outside the gates of Authority have said that they will continue the work only once the state government fulfills its promise of regularising these employees.

Around 100 workers also protested outside the office of Noida MLA Pankaj Singh on September 8 and 14 raising their demands.

The workers under the banner of Noida Asthayi Karamchari Utthan Samiti (NUKAS) have said that the Noida Authority has been delaying their regularisation and dilly-dallying the same even as it has demanded creation of 3211 new posts upon which it can hire workers directly without any intervention of the contractors.

"Our demand for regularisation is still pending, but the Noida Authority has sought creation of new posts and has also said that it can bear the expenditure incurred upon them due to these new posts. We have demanded that since we are working for the past 20-30 years, the Authority should hire us rather than hiring anyone else," Vikas Kumar, president, NAKUS told TOI.

On October 18, 2016, the Noida Authority had written to the department of industrial development, Uttar Pradesh saying that it was capable of bearing the expenditure of appointing workers on 3211 new posts where hiring will be done directly without any invention of contractors. The letter to the then secretary, industrial development authority, is in possession of TOI.

In the latest letter by Sitaram Yadav dated June 13, 2017, joint secretary, UP government, the Authority has been asked to submit a revised proposal on the issue.

"The Authority is dilly-dallying the matter and has still not sent a proper proposal to the government saying that it is ready to retain us (older employees) on the new posts. What if it hires new people? If it can bear the cost for 3211 employees, why is there a delay in keeping us on these posts," Sunil Tak, city president, Akhil Bhartiya Safai Kaamgaar Sangathan told TOI.

The employees fear that once the new posts are created, the Authority might not retain the existing contractual workers and instead hire new ones, leaving them in lurch and are demanding that a list of employees which will be retained on these new posts be released and sent to the government.

"Giving such an assurance will not be possible. We have had meetings with these employees and we have offered to them that they take facilities of employee provident fund and employee state insurance but they do not agree. They have asked for jobs for the dependents of those employees who are nearing retirement," Rajesh Singh, officer on special duty, Noida Authority told TOI.