Mumbai: Courts refuse stay on MSRTC workers’ dismissal notices

MUMBAI: Two industrial courts refused to give a stay on showcause notices for dismissals issued to MSRTC workers participating in the indefinite strike, an official said on Friday — the 58th day of the strike. The MSRTC management dismissed 182 more employees from duties on Friday as stringent action for participating in the indefinite stir.
The official further said, “The MSRTC had issued showcause notices for dismissal to over 550 staffers in the past one week. Some of them approached the Latur and Yavatmal industrial courts to get a stay, but the courts rejected their plea.”
Following this, the MSRTC on Friday dismissed more workers, and the total number of people sacked from service till now is 241. “The reasons for dismissal were genuine. They instigated workers to stay away from duties and obstructed those who wanted to come back to work,” said an official.
As many as 2,369 employees had returned to work in two days (Wednesday and Thursday) after the MSRTC management set a new deadline of December 23, for revoking suspensions, dismissals, transfers and criminal charges against staffers.
The number of employees on indefinite strike are now less than 69,000 as they await the next court hearing which is scheduled for January 5 next year. Officials said 2,796 staffers have been transferred while a total of 10,731 suspended from work till date.