09/12/2020
No Salary Since Jan, UPPCL Contract Workers Threaten Indefinite Strike | NewsClick
“We have been not paid(/)wages since January 2020. Every time we raise our demands, they
hand us a lollipop, but this time we are not going
to budge,”
saidMAPS
Singh, adding that "despite
INTERACTIVE
ELECTION
(https://elections.newsclick.in/)
not being paid salaries in the past 12 months,
we have worked silently in the interest of
common citizen and with complete devotion till date, but nancial obligations and di culties
had become intolerable now."
Nand Kishor, a lineman from Bijnor, working on contract basis over the past decade, said that
while the Yogi Adityanath government was boasting of 24-hour power supply in the state as
an achievement, it is also neglecting the livelihood of thousands of electricity employees
working as contractual worker.
"It's only because we work for more than 16 hours that they're able to give continuous power
supply to people and farmers But, but they're (the UP government) not ready to address our
issues," he said.
The contractual workers of Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Ltd. (UPPCL), despite not being
paid for almost a year, continue to work tirelessly in the hope that their jobs will be
regularised one day. "These workers play an important role in the department’s work across
the state. Over decades, many of them have lost their lives and a large number has been
seriously injured while repairing transmission lines, but never have they received even a
single rupee of compensation from the government," a worker told NewsClick.
The union has also demanded speeding up the job regularisation process so that those
working in the power department for the past over two decades would get regular jobs and
bene ts. A majority of them work as linesmen and meter readers, who are the backbone of
the power department.
This is not the rst time that power employees in UP are protesting against delay in salaries.
During the ongoing pandemic, the linesmen and other contractual workers of UPPCL have
repeatedly raised the issue of timely payment of salaries.
Read Also: Power Sector Employees in Uttar Pradesh
Begin Fight Against Privatisation of Electricity
Distribution (https://www.newsclick.in/power-sectoremployees-uttar-pradesh-begin- ght-againstprivatisation-electricity-distribution)
Recently, united under the Power Employees’ Joint Action (https://www.newsclick.in/UP-statepower-employees-protest-against-privatisation-PuVVNL) Committee (PEJAC), engineers and
all other employees of UPPCL held protests against the Bharatiya Janata Party state
government’s move to privatise distribution of electricity in the state.
Get the latest reports & analysis with people's perspective on Protests,
movements & deep analytical videos, discussions of the current a airs in your
https://www.newsclick.in/No-Salary-Since-Jan-UPPCL-Contract-Workers-Threaten-Indefinite-Strike
2/9