The Municipal Corporation Employees’ Union on Wednesday staged a demonstration outside the residence of mayor Inderjit Kaur, beating drums and clapping to draw attention to what they described as the state government’s “indifference” towards long-pending demands of civic workers.
The protest was led by union chairman Naresh Dhingan.
Speaking at the gathering, Dhingan said that although the Punjab government had regularised sanitation workers and sewermen nearly three years ago, a large number of employees were left out of the process. According to him, over 800 workers, including several Class-IV employees such as drivers and beldars, continue to work on temporary terms because they were declared “overage” or excluded during scrutiny.
He added that despite repeated representations to both the state government and the municipal corporation, no steps have been taken to include these workers in the regularisation list. “We are using drums and claps to wake up a government that has been sleeping on our demands,” he remarked.
Dhingan also accused the Aam Aadmi Party of going back on its pre-election promise to abolish the contract system across Punjab and introduce direct recruitment. “Instead of ending the contractual hiring pattern, the MC is issuing new appointments on contract, which the union will not accept,” he said.
The union leaders alleged that the community, which has been handling door-to-door garbage collection for generations, is being sidelined while the work is being shifted to private firms. Secondary garbage dumping points, they argued, are in poor condition, often causing long queues of vehicles and delays in collection.
The union demanded that the outsourcing of garbage collection be halted immediately and that jobs be protected for existing workers. The protest continued for nearly three hours before the mayor held discussions with the union members. Leaders handed over a detailed memorandum outlining their demands.
The mayor said the MC House has already passed a resolution seeking the regularisation of overage employees. She added that another resolution to regularise more than 400 gardeners, beldars and drivers has also been forwarded and is currently under consideration.