HYDERABAD: Urging them to withdraw their strike plans, Minister KT Rama Rao on Tuesday promised an end to the issues faced by Village Revenue Assistants (VRAs). However, the VRAs, who insisted that the government accept their demands first, refused to call off their strike.
As promised, Rama Rao met the VRAs on Tuesday. It may be recalled here that the State government has decided to use the services of 3,354 VRAs in the Irrigation department as ‘lashkars’.
“We have just 1,000 lashkars in the Irrigation department and there are around 4,000 vacancies. Once these VRAs are made ‘lashkars’, the department would then be able to operate gates of projects,” an Irrigation department offical said. At present, the junior engineers with the help of farmers and locals are operating the gates of minor irrigation projects.