Sir, The work boycott call of power employees in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir has caused inconvenience and hardships to the masses for the last few days without any of their reason and fault. The tool down strike by power employees has largely affected the constant power supply which slowly went off in different areas at different times, thereby causing complete black out in UT. The sudden breakdown of electricity for a long time has taken people by surprise as they were not prepared to bear this interrupted cut. The most affected by this power cut were patients whose treatment devices running on electricity stopped working. The students and businesses community also suffered a lot due to non availability of power supply. The strike by power employees is genuine or not is not my concern because it is between the administration and employees to sort out the issue. But, why people will suffer unnecessarily due to strikes is off-course my concern because we are not party to this issue anyway. We are paying power tariff on time and also use electricity judiciously. We are also cooperating with the department whenever there appears any technical fault in any kind of situation or season. But,this approach of the union is not acceptable where they can take society at ransom to get their demands redressed. There were other options available for Power employees to press their demands. They can highlight their grievances through various means without resorting to stop work that led to public trouble. One can not use strike as a weapon. The en masse strike that may have a large impact on society can not be justified in the modern world. Therefore, it will be better for the union leaders to engage in talks with the administration and get redressal to their genuine demands. The Government has already reached out to union leaders and listened to their grievances with patience. Now, it is the responsibility of the union to respond positively keeping in view the large interests of the society in consideration. It is also the duty of every employee body to avoid such strikes in future that can have a direct impact on the lives of people. Lastly, thanks to our brave Jawans of the Army who took over the power restoration work in their hands on the request of the LG’s administration. Rubon Saproo Roop Nagar, Jam
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