BENGALURU: As a cascading effect of the two-day nationwide strike on March 28 and 29 by trade unions, public who visited post offices on Wednesday when normalcy in operations were restored were put to much hardship.
Serpentine queues outside all major post offices in Bengaluru today ensured it took hours to avail any service there.
The National Federation of Postal Employees and National Union of Postal Employees took part in the strike which covered 60% of staff in Bengaluru Region (Bengaluru Urban, Bengaluru Rural and Channapatna) taking part. Most of those who took part returned to work today.
While a senior postal employee claimed that there were no complaints from public, the long queues and experience of visitors gave a contradictory picture. Among them was Krithika S, employed in a private firm who wanted to send a parcel across.
"I went to Vijaya Nagar post office first but seeing the rush there, I decided to visit the Rajaji Nagar post office. Even here, I had to wait for 1.5 hours before I could send my parcel," she said. Unusually long queues were spotted across many offices in the City.
LK Dash, Postmaster General of the Region told TNIE that a majority of the 231 small POs in the Region were shut.
"All the 8 Head Post offices in the Region were kept open while all major post offices including those in Indira Nagar, Jayanagar, Basavanagudi, Rajaji Nagar, Yelahanka and Yesvantpur stayed open. We managed to sustain operations, particularly the Speed Post sections, with the skeletal staff we had on hand," he said.
Chief Postmaster General, Karnataka Circle, Rajendra S Kumar said that 35% of the post offices in North Karnataka and 20% of them in South Karnataka were impacted during the strike.