Agitators complain of uneasiness

BHUBANESWAR: Several computer training coordinators, who were protesting at Lower PMG area here over their various demands including regularisation of jobs and inclusion in Odisha Reservation of Vacancies (ORV) Act, on Thursday complained of uneasiness and some of them even fainted.

The protestors under the banner of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) School Coordinators’ Association, Odisha, on Thursday took out a rally from Station Square to Lower PMG where several demonstrators, including women, complained of uneasiness and were rushed to Capital Hospital. “Several computer training coordinators started feeling uneasy due to the humid conditions. Some of them even fainted at Lower PMG. About 25 persons, including women, were then rushed to the Capital Hospital,” the association’s working president Soumya Ranjan Mallik told this newspaper. Some others were given Oral Re-hydration Solution (ORS) at the protest site as they also complained of uneasiness, he said.

The protestors alleged that they raised their demands in November last year to include them under ORV Act, appoint 4,000 more computer training coordinators, set up computer labs in block grant schools and others. They claimed that the State Government assured them in December last year that it will look into their demands, but to no avail. “Our services have been outsourced by two private companies IL&FS and TCIL. Our term will end by March 2019.

If the State Government does not regularise our jobs, it should at least give us the status of contractual employees for the time being,” Mallik said. “We met School and Mass Education Minister Badri Narayan Patra and handed him our resignations as our demands were not being fulfilled, but he did not accept those and the talks remained inconclusive. We will continue our protests,” he added.