Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, May 14: Former Minister and Vice President, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee (JKPCC), Ghulam Mohammed Saroori today appealed Lt Governor Girish Chandra Murmu to release pending payments of contractors and wages of daily wagers across the Jammu and Kashmir.
In a statement, the former Minister said that daily wagers, casual labourers who work with dedication have not been paid their wages for the past several months, adding that these people do a lot of hard work without any returns.
He said that in view of the festivals of “Eid and Diwali” this is a time that Government would realize the difficulties of these employees and issue orders for release of salaries.
“It is irony of sorts that these employees are not being paid even minimum wages,” Saroori said.
Saroori also expressed concern over the delayed payment to the contractors who worked in various Government sponsored projects in various departments like Roads and Building, JKPCC, PMGSY and PHE (Jal Shakti Department).
“The liabilities must be cleared which are pending from last six months. These people spend money in government projects so that their payment is made by the respective department timely. However, their payment was delayed in unjustified manner,” he said.
Saroori said that when timely payments were not made to the contractors, it resulted into hampering of ongoing developmental projects or works in various departments, adding as a result many contracts avoided completing the work in time.
Under these circumstances, Saroori said, rural and far-flung areas become the victim of non-payment of contractors because the works get stopped.
“It will also hamper quality work because good contractors will stop investing in projects in view of lack of interest from the Government to clear their pending payments,” he said.
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