11,000 MSRTC workers in Pune division resume duties after HC order
We are hoping that by Monday, this number will reach above 90% and on the other hand, we also have contract staff workers to run the bus operations, says official
Nearly 80% of the 13,000 workers or 11,000 workers at the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) Pune division have resumed duties after the Bombay High Court (HC) asked the protesting employees to do so by April 15. From Saturday, April 16, strict action might be taken against those who haven’t resumed work.
One of the senior MSRTC officials on condition of anonymity said, “Since the HC has given instructions to workers about resuming work, the flow of protesting workers coming back to work is good in the Pune division. Till now, out of the 13,000 workers in the Pune division, more than 80% have joined. We are hoping that by Monday, this number will reach above 90% and on the other hand, we also have contract staff workers to run the bus operations.”
“We are now planning to resume the maximum scheduled bus operations on all the routes which were there before the strike started and start the bus service in full force. In the last five months, there have been huge losses for the organisation as we missed the major season of Diwali, the year ending and the Gudi Padwa festival when people travel the most. We would try to recover our losses now during the summer vacations,” he said.
On April 6, a division bench of chief justice Dipankar Datta and justice MS Karnik in its observation instructed the workers to resume duties till April 15 as five months had already passed. Since the last, more than five months, the MSRTC workers and their unions have been protesting for various demands. A Kruti Samiti of the unions was formed earlier to strike a conversation with the state government. But apparently, the main demand of merging the MSRTC with the state government was compromised according to the workers so all the workers (apart from the union members) had spontaneously started the strike.
Sanjay Munde, a suspended ST driver from the Pune division said, “We protested for five months and now we are ready to accept the HC order and accordingly, I along with thousands of other protesting workers have resumed work. But our demand for the merger of the organisation will continue in the legal fight with the state government.”
Meanwhile, show-cause notices have been sent to several workers and after three rounds of inquiry hearings, they will be dismissed from work if they don’t resume duties. The Pune division has suspended over 650 workers till now.
