THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Around 8,000 KSRTC empanelled staff in the state have decided to boycott the Lok Sabha election to protest against the government. Though the empanelled conductors have been reinstated a month ago the staff claim that it was just an election stunt as no proper duty is being assigned to them and also recently the High Court has ordered KSRTC to remove 1,565 empanelled drivers by April 30 from the rolls.
They allege that the various demands raised by them over several meetings have not been addressed yet. The demands include bus passes to the empanelled staff during their travels and monthly wages instead of daily wages.
“Though the government took a decision to reinstate us a month ago, the corporation has not sent any official orders to its units. We reach for the duty by paying from our own pockets and the officials send us back without assigning any duty for the day. However they are still replacing us by assigning our duty to the drivers and the mechanical staff, the same method which was followed during our absence,” said Dinesh Babu, Empanelled Samara Samiti leader.
The decision to reinstate us was an election stunt as even after 47-day long agitation held by us the call to reinstate us was taken just two days before the election dates were declared, he added.
As many as 8,200 empanelled staff are currently working for the corporation. The empanelled staff plans
to stage a protest in front of the secretariat from April 21 till April 23 evening. The decision to reinstate us was one of the many hollow promises made by the government as it is not being implemented in a true way.
Even though, the schedules were getting cancelled due to the shortage of conductors the corporation was not ready to assign us duties.
In a recent meeting held with the KSRTC MD he assured that the corporation is planning to file an appeal regarding the HC order against the empanelled staff, said Dinesh.