UT Employees Observes Massive Protest Dharna And Proceed March Towards Governor House

By 121 News

Chandigarh April 07, 2021:- The Employees of  Electricity, Water Supply, Horticulture, Road, Transport, Education,  ICCW, CITCO, BDPO, Health and other departments of UT & MC held a massive Dharna and demonstration under the banner of Federation of  UT Employees and worker Chandigarh.  The leaders of Sayunkat Karamchari Manch, FOSWAC, Pendu Sangharash Committee, Kisan Noujwan Morcha and the leaders of Kisan Morcha and Central Trade Unions participated in the Dharna and whole heartedly supported the agitation against privatization. The protesters proceed March towards Governor House who were trying to stop at 17-18 light point but the protestor tried to break barricades and sitting in the roads then SDM (Central) came on the spot and accept the memorandum addressed to the Governor and Administrator UT Chandigarh.   

Secretary All India State Government Employees Federation  and General Secretary of the Federation Gopal Datt Joshi, President of the Federation Raghbir Chand, Sr. Vice President Rajinder Katoch, Powermen President Dhian Singh, Joint Secretary Amrik Singh, Pan Singh and Sukhwinder Singh, Kashmir Singh, Ram Saroop,  Manmohan Singh while addressing the Dharna strongly criticize the privatization policy of the Govt. of India and blame that Govt. of India during the Covid-19 pandemic place the draft Electricity Amendment Bill 2020, which was not placed before the parliament and without waiting the passing of the 2020 bill decide to privatize the functioning of discom's of all 8 UT's including Chandigarh, which is against the provision of Electricity Act 2003, while opposing the bidding process of UT Chandigarh he strongly condemned the Chandigarh Administration for gross violation of Rules Resolution and Acts and demanded to scrape the bidding system. He further said that UT electricity Department is generating profit since last 5 years, last year department earn profit Rs. 258 Cr. And this year Rs. 117 Cr line loss 9.51% last year & current year 13.5 (excluding IST loss), which is below the 15% target fix by MoP. The rate in Rs. 2.75 upto 1^st 150 unit. No single paisa has been enhances since last 5 years & bagged best utility award since last 5 years. Even acute shortage of men & material the standard performance is being implemented 100% and providing 24x7 Hr uninterrupted power supply to its consumer thus there is no any reason to sale the 100% share of the department to private money monger.   

Sukhwinder Singh Sekhon and Balbir Singh Musafir (AIKS), Kuldeep Singh (CITU), Raj Kumar and Devi Dyal (AITUC), Kulbir Singh (INTUC), Gurdeep Singh (Punjab Board Corporation Mahasangh), Baljinder Singh Bittu  and Pardeep Chopra (FOSWAC), Daljit Singh Palsora, Gurpreet Singh Somal (Pendu Sangharash Committee), Kirpal Singh (Kisan Naujwan Morcha) while blaming the Chandigarh Administration said that the Chandigarh Administration open the tenders violating all the rules and procedure of bidding system, even in absence of Nodal Officer appointed for the purpose while congratulating the employees for their massive participation in the protest Leaders said that the Chandigarh Administration on one side stating that uniform policy will be adopted in case of all the UT's but in contradiction of the statement it has again stated the process again violating the term & Condition of bidding process and said that it is objectionable that when a bidding process has been started and date of sale of RFP have been finalized then it is illegal to amend the RFP Documents after the finalization of bidders, it can only be possible atleast before 45 days of the sale of RFP. Thus, strongly demanded to cancel the entire bidding process but it is unfortunate that instead of cancellation of entire bidding system,, the Administration directed to open the bids even in absence of Nodal Officer which is matter of high level inquiry.  The speakers further said that the amount of Security / ACD amount rupees 157 Crore is being handed over to private operators, similarly the GPF of Employees is being transferred to Private Trust (the step of decision will lose the employees and consumers) beside other financial losses.

Rajinder Kumar, Sukhvir Singh, Bipin Sher Singh, Ranit Mishra, Dharminder Rahi, Ranveer Singh Rana, Harjinder Singh Bajwa, Harjinder Singh (SKM), Rekha Sharma, Naseeb Singh, Harpal Singh, Bihari Lal, Prem Pal (Federation), Ram Saroop, Manmohan Singh, Ujagar Singh Mohi (Pensioner's Association) also address the protest. All the leaders while addressing the protest warned the Administration that if the entire bidding process will not be cancelled then Electricity employees will observe 24 hrs. strike in all the shifts on 20^th April 2021 and all the organizations will back and support the strike of Electricity Employees and blamed that the Chandigarh Administration will be fully responsible for any inconvenience to the public due to agitation as the Administration remain miserably failed to resolve the issues and violating all the norms and guidelines of CVC while operating Biding process.