BENGALURU: The pourakarmikas called off their indefinite protest on Tuesday after the state government assured to fulfil their demands. About 5,000 pourakarmikas across the city stayed away from their work over the past two days, seeking regularisation of jobs and payment of salary directly to their bank accounts. Contractors were not giving them proper salary and week offs, they alleged.
On Tuesday, Minister of state for municipalities and local bodies Eshwara B Khandre and Minister of social welfare H Anjaneya met the protestors and assured that chief minister Siddaramaiah will hold a meeting on June 20 to address the problems of pourakarmikas.
“Haryana model might be implemented in the state as well to prevent harassment of pourakarmikas from the contractors and middlemen,” said Khandre.
BBMP Contract Pourakarmikas Association president Balan S said, “We have been assured
of a government order on June 20. If they fail to keep promise, we will again start our protest.”
“Pourakarmikas were being asked to work for 30 days a month and not given full salary by the contractors. They were even denied weekly offs and leaves,” said Obalesh, member, Manual scavenging monitoring committee.
Protests in all the 26 districts were called off and th e pourakarmikas will be back to work on Wednesday.
Garbage piles up during protest, city stinks With more than 5,000 pourakarmikas joining the protests, 8,000 tonnes of garbage were not collected from different city areas in the past two days.
According to sources, the door-to-door garbage collection was hit in parts of Jayanagar, JP Nagar, Vijayanagar, Chamarajpet, Nagarbhavi, Hennur, R T Nagar, Banashankari, Vasanth Nagar and many other places due to protest.