Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, June 4: Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party (JKAP) leader and former minister Ghulam Hassan Mir today expressed serious concern over the plight of National Youth Corps (NYC) members, who are acting as frontline workers in battle against COVID pandemic but getting peanuts in terms of wages.
In a statement issued here, Mir said nearly 6000 NYC qualified youth who were engaged by the Government through District Recruitment Boards are working in various departments with a hope to get absorbed in the Government sector permanently.
“But unfortunately these hard working youth, most of whom are Post Graduates and some with professional degrees have been exploited by the successive Governments in Jammu and Kashmir,” Mir said, and added that these youth have been on the frontline whenever J&K faced natural calamities and disasters.
“Be it the devastating floods of 2014 or the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic, the NYC youth have been giving their best with utmost dedication and sincerity of purpose. However, the no Government including the present dispensation in J&K ever thought of their hardships which can’t be mitigated by a meagre remuneration of Rs 2500 per month,” Mir observed.
He said that the Government should come up with a comprehensive policy to get these youth along with other daily rated workers, casual labourers and need based workers regularized so as to enable them to earn a dignified livelihood and feed their families accordingly.
“The Government must pay heed to the social stigma attached with the temporary nature of their jobs which have caused immense distress to their families. In the majority of such cases, the NYC youth are not able to find a suitable match and similarly, some of them are highly depressed due to matrimonial discords because of uncertain nature of their duties,” Mir remarked.
The JKAP leader demanded that till these NYC youth are regularized in different departments, the Government should revise and enhance their wages as per the labour law. This action can bring happiness to the economically down-trodden families of NYC youth,” Mir added.
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