Excelsior Correspondent
REASI, May 22: The five – day long strike by workers on the Railway tunnel projects (T-13) in village Dugga, Tehsil Arnas, has come to an end after successful intervention by Sub-Divisional administration.
The workers had been on strike since May 16 after HCC (Hindustan Construction Company) had pulled out of active work following various issues related to financial distress and had outsourced the work to a new company namely VCCL (Vensar Construction Company Ltd) of Hyderabad.
The local had gone on strike alleging that VCCL has been stealthily bringing in non-local sub-contractors and workers. Local workers feared loss of livelihood and other terms of benefits which were earlier available to them.
Hundreds of workers had been protesting at the site and before District Administration for the last 5 days and had stopped all work on the tunnels, resulting in losses to the tune of Rs 25 lakh per day for the executing companies.
SDM Dharmari Yasin Choudhary intervened on behalf of the Railway authorities, namely KRCL and companies HCC & VCCL and initiated a positive dialogue with the
protesting workers.
In a marathon 10 hour long negotiation that stretched from afternoon to night, the SDM mediated in depth the finer details of the issue between the companies and the 300 odd workers who had gathered. Success was finally achieved late around 9.30 pm at the HCC camp site in Dugga with VCCL agreeing over an extra half hour of overtime for workers along with assurance of employment to local skilled workers.
Following the resolution, the whole party went to the tunnel site and re-initiated the work at 10.00 pm for the night shift.
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