Chennai, January 12: After eight days of strike, Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) employees will resume their from Friday following intervention from the Madras High Court. The transport workers union withdrew their strike on Thursday.
The employees were demanding wage hikes for over a year and clearance of arrears amounting to Rs 7,543 crore, including retirement benefits and provident fund. The striking unions wanted the factor for wage revision to be fixed at 2.57 times, but the government, after 23 rounds of talks, has agreed for a 2.44 times raise.
“We incur a loss of Rs 9 crore every day as we’ve not hiked tariff for years. We offer the cheapest travel compared to neighbouring states. The hike we’ve offered alone will cost an additional Rs. 1,000 crore a year,” an official had said, NDTV reported.
The stir had severely affected commuters, even though the government tried to keep the transport services running by bringing in temporary drivers and conductors, in addition to the employees who were not on strike. Southern Railway operated more services to cope with the extra rush due to the ongoing strike.
As many as 17 trade unions had launched the indefinite strike since January 4 night, with scores of TNSTC staff joining the protest.