TheHaryanaRoadways employees have extended their strike till October 22 against the state government's decision to introduce 700 private buses, even as the stir entered fourth day causing inconvenience to commuters.
The roadways employees union had Wednesday announced the extension of their strike by another two days and decided to further extend it by another 72 hours on Friday, alleging the state government's "apathetic attitude" towards their demand.
Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar has said roadways employees union leaders have a right to raise issues pertaining to the workers, but not to interfere in decisions related to state policies.
Khattar said that decision to introduce 700 private buses was a policy matter.
"As far as employees issues are concerned they can raise these, but they should not interfere in government's policy matters," he told reporters.
However, union leaders remained defiant and accused the state government of opening the route to complete privatisation of the Haryana Roadways.
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"Through its move to introduce over 700 private buses, the state government wants to open the doors for complete privatisation of the roadways, which at present is running in an efficient manner. We are asking who stands to benefit from their policy, there is no demand for this from the public for private buses or from anybody else except the government," said state president of Sarv Karamchari Sangh Dharambir Phogat.
He said the government has remained adamant on its stance.
"They have not initiated any talks with the striking employees because they are not concerned about public welfare. We understand inconvenience being caused to public, but for this government is to be blamed. They have shown apathetic attitude and left us with no choice. Now, we have been forced to extend our strike by 72 hours, up till October 22," Phogat said.
For the fourth day Friday, authorities plied buses, mainly on short routes, by taking services of drivers and conductors from other government departments including the police.
Policemen in uniform have also been driving the roadways buses for the past two days. The authorities hired buses from educational institutions and pressed these into service on several short distance routes throughout the state.
Justifying move to introduce 700 private buses, the government has maintained that the Haryana Roadways at present has only 4,100 buses. Given the demand, the state needs 15,000 buses to cater to the population of over 2.5 crore.
The government says roping in private buses on public-private partnership (PPP) mode is in employees' interest.
While private operators will run new buses and have their own drivers, the conductors will be employees of the Haryana Roadways, who will submit the receipts to the government.
Before the roadways workers' strike began on Tuesday, the government had invoked Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) and later suspended several roadways employees for participating in the strike. Many have also been booked for defying ESMA.