Sanitary workers protest delay in July salary

Coimbatore: More than 300 contract sanitary workers with the Tirupur city corporation boycotted work on Tuesday and protested delay in paying their last month’s salary.
Workers from 40 wards joined together and protested in three zones of the corporation limits.
K Rangaraj, general secretary, Centre of Indian Trade Unions, said, “As per the district collector’s direction, sanitary workers should be paid a daily wage of Rs 420. After deduction for employees’ provident fund and other benefits, what they get from contractor is around Rs 300 a day. While they are usually paid the salary between 5th and 10th of every month, more than 500 contract workers have not received their salary for July so far.”
Pointing out that the collector had increased the daily wage for sanitary workers to Rs 510 on August 16, they demanded the city corporation to implement the revised wage from next month and pay the salary by fifth of every month.
Rangaraj said officials should also take steps to test the sanitary workers for Covid-19 at regular intervals and provide them quality safety gears.
Tirupur corporation officials held a meeting with the protestors in the presence of the contractor and assured them to pay the pending salary in a couple of days.