PAU staff holds protest march

Ludhiana: The Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) Employees Union and PAU Class IV Workers’ Union held a protest march on Thursday against the university authorities to press for the fulfilment of their demands. PAU Employees’ Union president Baldev Singh Walia and general secretary Gurpreet Singh Dhillon led the march, which ended in front of the institution’s administrative block. Later, a large number of employees sat on dharna in front of the main gate of the administrative block.
Walia, while addressing the gathering, said all the demands of employees were genuine, but due to indifferent approach of the vice-chancellor towards non-teaching employees, these demands were not met. He highlighted the need to reduce the ‘work experience’ period for promotion of technical staff, increase in the number of posts of car/jeep drivers, and supervisors to manage the problems being faced by employees in the local audit, besides restoring the promotions of eligible employees stopped by the authorities without any valid reason, appointment of only non-teaching employees on non-teaching posts, and opening of Gate 4 permanently.
He further said if these demands were not met soon, the face of the agitation would be changed. He said on the one hand, promotions of non-teaching staff were stopped without any valid reason, while on the other hand, authorities had re-appointed many retired employees, which had resulted in resentment among employees.