BENGALURU: The second round of discussion held with different unions of the Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation to discuss wage hike for transport employees on Wednesday failed. With this, the chief minister will have to intervene in the matter as the earlier meeting with Minister B Sriramulu had also failed, and the unions have set a deadline of March 21 to fulfil the demand.
In the meeting convened by KSRTC MD Anbu Kumar, MDs of three other corporations and representatives of six unions, including the AITUC-affiliated KSRTC Staff and Workers’ Federation, had taken part. However, the officials and union leaders could not arrive at a consensus.
Transport activist and president of KSRTC Staff & Workers Federation, H V Anantha Subbarao, said while the transport minister had offered a pay hike of 8-10 per cent in the March 8 meeting, the KSRTC MD offered a 10-14 per cent hike. “Though our initial demand was a minimum hike of 25 per cent, we have reduced it to 20 per cent. But the MD said the corporations are running under losses and the government is still in the stage of financial recovery due to the pandemic,” he said.
The union leaders, however, cited that the government has given an interim relief of a 17 per cent hike to government employees and 20 per cent for KPTCL workers. “The MD has assured us that he would appraise the CM about our demand soon. We are also planning to take a delegation to the CM in a couple of days,” Subbarao added.
As the transport unions are planning to go on an indefinite strike from March 21, a day before Ugadi, lakhs of people travelling to their hometowns from Bengaluru and other districts will be inconvenienced if the matter is not resolved.