Karnataka - Mangalore   

MCC ’pourakarmikas’ demand regularisation of service

RAISING THEIR VOICE: Pourkarmikas of the Mangalore City Corporation staging a dharna in front of the corporation building in Mangalore on Thursday.

MANGALORE: As the city celebrated the birth anniversary of the Father of the Nation on Thursday, “Pourakarmikas” (sanitary workers) of Mangalore City Corporation struck work, demanding better working conditions.

Holding a garlanded photograph of B.R Ambedkar aloft, the agitators staged a dharna in front of the corporation building at Lalbagh. They tabled a 22-point list of demands and urged the authorities to fulfil them the earliest. The protestors threatened to intensify the stir if their demands were not met soon. As many as 130 pourakarmikas said that they had been working on daily wages for the past two decades and hence they should be absorbed as permanent government employees. At present, there were 160 unfilled vacancies for pourkarmikas in the corporation, they said.

Led by the Dalit Sangharsha Samiti (Ambedkar Wada), the protestors raised slogans against the alleged negligence of the district administration towards the downtrodden people. Claiming that all the pourakarmikas were Dalits, the district secretary of the samiti S.P. Ananda said: “When employees of other government departments get all the benefits, pourakarmikas feel that they are being differentiated because they happen to be Dalits.”

Dalits continued to perform the centuries old, menial-caste duties that rendered them untouchable. But, there was no alternative. The Government had never been serious about empowering this section or creating alternative employment for people employed in menial tasks. The least the Government could do was improving their working conditions, Mr. Ananda said. Kanthappa Alangar, a pourakarmika’ said: “The city will turn into a volcano of filth if we do not do our job for a few days. We hope that when the people have to clean the dirt themselves, they will stop for a minute and ponder over the circumstances under which we work.” The agitators, who turned restive when no official turned up to receive their memorandum, were pacified by Mayor Ganesh Hosbettu. He vouched to “personally take a delegation of the representatives of the pourakarmikas to Bangalore where they can table their demands before the Chief Minister.”

In a memorandum submitted to the Mayor, the agitators demanded that the Supreme Court directive to regularise the services of 13,000 pourakarmikas in the State be implemented. Implementation of the fifth pay commission’s report, promotions for cleanliness attendants who had been working in the corporation for the past 25 years, medical benefits for the workers and their dependants, a reserve fund to help educate the children of pourakarmikas and prevention of their entry into the profession were among their demands.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Passenger traffic up at Mangalore airport
Police burst outdated shells: PUCL chief
Judges should be paid more: Lokayukta
Special children take out peace rally
BJP re-constitutes Assembly teams
MCC ’pourakarmikas’ demand regularisation of service

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu