Regularisation: Mamta Ashu draws ire from Ludhiana MC employees for ‘raising objection’

Incident comes a day after Mamta Ashu sought action against erring officials who added names of dead and and long-absent Ludhiana MC contractual employees in the lists sent to be considered for regularisation

Ludhiana A day after city councillor Mamta Ashu sought action against erring officials who added names of dead and and long-absent contractual employees — including 3,542 sweepers and sewermen — in the lists sent to be considered for regularisation during the municipal corporation (MC) General House’s July meeting, a section of Class 4 employees on Wednesday staged a protest outside her house in Model Gram.

Councillor Mamta Ashu clarifying her stance on regularisation amid sloganeering by contractual MC employees outside her Model Gram residence. (Harvinder Singh/HT)

Ashu had again sought action against officials during the MC House meeting held on Tuesday, where the resolution for regularisation was approved.

High drama was witnessed outside Ashu’s house after MP Ravneet Bittu, mayor Balkar Sandhu, councillors Narinder Kala, Baljinder Bunty among other Congress leaders reached the spot as a show of support for Ashu, the wife of former cabinet minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu.

Protesters had planned to dump piles of garbage outside the councillor’s house, but were stopped by the mayor around 200 m away from the spot.

While employees accused Ashu of “creating hurdles” and opposing the resolution to regularise the contractual employees, the councillor was adamant that her objections lay elsewhere. Elaborating, Ashu said she had not opposed the resolution for regularisation, rather only objected to the alleged discrepancies in the lists to ensure only genuine employees are regularised.

Ashu stepped outside her house amid sloganeering to further clarify her stance saying, “We have never opposed the resolution to regularise contractual employees and it was the Congress, who had notified regularisation of employees in the past.”

“I had only demanded action against the officials who added the names of dead employees in the lists in the past. Our only concern is that genuine employees are regularised and non working employees should not be benefitted,” she added.

Congress leaders including Bittu accused the opposition parties in the civic body of misleading the employees, reiterating that Ashu had not opposed the resolution to regularise the jobs of contractual employees.