Kerala - Alappuzha   

Strike hits normal life in Alappuzha

ALAPPUZHA: The one-day token strike called by a section of government employees across the country threw normal life off the track in Alappuzha on Tuesday with postal, revenue and transport services being affected. Administrative duties in Central and State-run schools were affected partially.

While the District Collectorate wore a deserted look with only in-charge District Collector Koshy John and a few of his subordinates turning up, the most hit was the water transport sector in the district.

All the 45 scheduled services of the Kerala State Water Transport Department (KSWTD) was cancelled following the strike. According to Alappuzha/Ernakulam KSWTD Traffic Superintendent A.T. Antony, the department runs 45 boat services in the four districts of Alappuzha, Kottayam, Ernakulam and Kollam. All these were called off.

Severely hit were people from several areas in Kuttanad where the KSWTD boats are the only mode of transport. In spite of the strike being announced earlier, several passengers from areas such as Kuppapuram, Kainakary and the R-Block region were seen fuming at the Alappuzha boat jetty, saying that they would now have to pay huge sums to paddleboats to take them home.

People who wanted to travel to areas such as Nedumudi and nearby areas were seen depending on KSRTC buses though they would have to hire paddleboats from the Nedumudi jetty to go to interior areas.

Mr. John said few of the Collectorate staff turned up for duty on Tuesday. However, there were Revenue officials who attended to duties in the Ambalapuzha, Karthikapally taluks where there were reports of sea erosion affecting normal life.

One sector, however, that was not affected in a major way were the road repair works taken up the Public Works Department.

With Tuesday being the ‘deadline’ the Chief Minister had announced for completing the repair works, labourers were seen hurrying to finish off the works in several areas on the National Highway-47, that is, wherever the weather remained favourable.

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