Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 14

It is a long-drawn out process before the services of 4,022 contractual ‘safai karmacharis’ are regularised and another 15,362 outsourced workers are taken on contract by the Local Government Department in its various civic bodies across the state.

As the decision involves annual financial implication of nearly Rs 243 crore, the issue is being taken up in the coming meeting of the Cabinet Sub-Committee, reconstituted to review the old Act for regularising services of ad hoc, contractual, daily wagers and outsourced employees, on June 16.

Demanding regularisation of services, the sanitation workers have been on a strike for the past month in different civic bodies. To regularise the services of 4,022 contractual employees, the department faces an annual financial burden of Rs 42 crore and for bringing 15,362 outsourced employees on contract, it needs another Rs 201 crore, said a senior government functionary.

The workforce can be regularised or the outsourced can be brought on contract once the Cabinet Sub-Committee, comprising Local Government Minister Brahm Mohindra, Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal, Rural Development and Panchayat Minister Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Technical Education Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Cooperation and Jails Minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, makes recommendations on repealing the old Act of 2016 and framing a new one to provide relief package to employees of the state.

Local Bodies Minister Brahm Mohindra said to move forward, the sub-committee was meeting on Wednesday to work out a formula to end the impasse. He said due to efforts of the department and MLAs, the strike had already ended in Muktsar, Patiala, Ludhiana, Amritsar, Jalandhar and some other places after a series of parleys were held with representatives of different workers’ unions.