Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR/ JAMMU, Oct 1: Police today foiled the protest march of State Government employees toward Assembly complex by detaining at least 30 employees’ leaders and dispersing others by using force. All the arrested leaders were later lodged in Srinagar Central jail.
Joint Consultative Committee (JCC), an amalgam of several employees’ unions had called for a five -day strike and protest programme to press for the implementation of the agreement signed between their leaders and the Government. The employees appeared at the Assembly entrance this morning and tried to break the security grid to enter its premises to raise protests there as the Autumn Session of the legislature is currently going on.
Heavy deployment of police and paramilitary forces intercepted them. Using battons they arrested several employees leaders and detained them initially to the two nearby Police Stations.
“Around 30 employees were arrested by police during our protest programme,” said Shabir Hussain, a senior JCC leader.
Hussain claimed that to foil their scheduled march, police had raided the houses of some top JCC leaders during the night including Haji Ashraf Bhat, Azhar Majrooh, Manzoor Ahmad Bhat and lodged them in different Police Stations in Tral, Lal Bazar, Qamarwari and Shaheed Gunj. He said all the arrested employees were shifted to Central jail, Srinagar.
As per the protest calendar, the employees would take out a peaceful torch march from Sher-i-Kashmir Park to the Chief Minister’s residence on Wednesday after evening Prayers. However, JCC has changed the date of ‘Assembly Gherao’ program from October 3 to 5 after the Government has announced October 3 as State holiday.
Hussain said: “As per the announcement, a complete lock out will be observed in all Government and Public Sector Undertakings offices on October 4 and 5.” He added that on Saturday thousands of Government employees would be protesting to press for their demands.
Even the State Government issued a circular reiterating that the strikes by the employees unions are illegal and will entail strict action including imposing no work no pay rule, besides other punitive measures.
“Wages would not be paid to those employees who would remain absent and may also suffer break in service or face dismissal from service.
However, it has no impact on the JCC leadership in Kashmir, who claim that this time they would take this “movement to its logical end.”
Senior JCC leader, Abdul Qayoom Wani, said that they would continue their protest program and no threat or warning from Government would deter their movement. “We are fighting for our rights. We have seen such warnings from Government in past as well. If Government failed to fulfill our demands, we will intensify our protest program,” the JCC leader threatened.
Among other things, the agitating employees are demanding increase in the retirement age from 58 year to 60 years, regularization of daily wagers and contractual workers and removal of pay anomalies.
The work in Government offices across Kashmir remained affected as the employees stayed away from work. Employees working in emergency services like hospitals and examination duty were exempted from the strike.
In Jammu, the employees from various departments and PSUs assembled near the office of Divisional Commissioners at Rail Head complex instead of already decided venue- Panama Chowk during the day today and held protest demonstration. They were not in large number today and many of them did not join the strike in view of the directive from the Government which has already declared employees strike as illegal and also warned that no wages will be given to the employees on strike and they will also be thrown out of service.
There was hardly any impact of the JCC led 5-day strike programme in the Government offices, PSUs and the Government schools as well in Jammu region. The attendance of the employees was also good and district administration and head of departments including District Officers were keeping supervision on the attendance as per directions from the Chief Secretary. Reports from other districts and tehsils of the region indicated that there was hardly any impact of the JCC-led strike.
The employees led by senior JCC leader S Kulwant Singh and a few others appeared at Rail Head complex, just closer to JKPCC office and then moved towards Divisional Commissioner’s office at around 11.30 am today. They held brief demonstration raising slogans in support of their demands and then dispersed. Some of them also addressed gathering and condemned the arrest of some employee leaders and crack down on their houses by cops. They claimed that Government was trying to gag employees’ voice.
While several JCC leaders have gone underground, many of them have even switched off their mobile phones. Several senior leaders did not dare to reach the decided venue sensing their arrest, thus demoralizing the cadre. With the warning issued by the Government, the employees leadership apparently has come under pressure and their agitation seems to have nearly flopped.
JCC leader Kulwant Singh when contacted claimed that employees held protest at Rail Head complex, as per programme already decided. He said on Oct 2, employees will take out candle march to CM’s residence and October 3 programme has been changed. On Oct 4, and 5 ` Kaam Chhor Hartal’ will be observed. He claimed that JCC will continue with its programme. He further claimed that in Kathua, Udhampur and Rajouri, employees held protest demonstrations. Mr Singh condemned the arrest of senior JCC members from Kashmir Fayaz Shabnam, Ashraf Bhat and others.
It has been observed that besides Jammu, a little impact of the strike was observed at Kathua, Rajouri and Udhampur while work in most of the offices went on smoothly. There was no strike in other district and tehsil offices in the region and attendance in offices was good.
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