Delhi HC puts brakes on Metro employees' proposed strike
New Delhi, June 29: A day before an indefinite strike proposed by a section of the Delhi Metro employees that would have led to mayhem for lakhs of commuters, the Delhi High Court on Friday ordered the staff not to do so or "till further orders".
The court order on the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation plea will be a relief for daily commuters who use the public service to commute within Delhi and neighbouring areas in the National Capital Region.
"Considering the fact that the petitioner (DMRC) is running a public utility service that caters to 25 lakh citizens of Delhi on a daily basis, who come largely from middle income group... I am inclined to grant ad-interim relief as sought in the application.
"Accordingly, the respondents (General Secretary of Metro Staff Council and others) are restrained from going on strike on June 30 or till further orders in the matter," read the court order.
Hours before the court order, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal appealed to the protesting staff to not go on strike and even warned of invoking the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA), if required, to stop the strike.
"Whereas all genuine demands of Metro employees should be met, the strike will cause inconvenience to lakhs of people. The strike should not take place. Whereas government will impose ESMA as a last resort, I urge the employees to not resort to strike," Kejriwal said in a tweet.
The DMRC is engaged in a dispute with its non-executive employees over pay scales and arrears. The 9,000 such employees had warned of a strike from Saturday if their demands were not met.
This workforce consists of station controllers, drivers, technicians, and other maintenance staff and facilitates day-to-day operations of the Metro.
These employees held a symbolic protest from June 19 onwards by holding sit-ins at platforms, wearing black armbands and boycotting lunch and rest hours. They threatened to go on a total strike from June 30.
The bone of contention, the employees said, is a 2007 DMRC rule through which the corporation had come up with two pay scales for executive and non-executive staff, entitling the former to pay grades/scales given to 'Schedule A' public sector units and a lower and different grade for the latter.
As per a compromise struck between the employees and the DMRC on July 23 last year, the corporation was to carry out some modifications in the pay grade and grant the protesting employees their arrears from July 1, 2015. However, the deal fell through subsequently.
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BJP ally Tipra Motha announces rally to protest attacks on minorities in Bangladesh
Agartala (PTI): Tipra Motha chief Pradyot Debbarma said his party, an ally of the BJP, will organise a rally on September 26 to protest the attacks on minorities in Bangladesh.
Debbarma made the announcement on Saturday after the party's youth wing YTF gave a deputation to the Assistant High Commissioner of Bangladesh in Agartala, seeking the safety of minorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
"This is not the first time that minorities, including Bengali Hindus and indigenous people, were attacked after the fall of the Sheikh Hasina-led government in Bangladesh. Minorities were attacked in Noakhali and Comilla districts too. Maharaja Bir Chandra Library was set on fire and books that were 300 years old were gutted," he said.
Urging the Centre to take up the issue, Debbarma said the time has come to raise it at the United Nations.
"We will stage a massive rally to protest the attack on minorities in Bangladesh on September 26. Our youth organisation YTF will also join the rally to raise voice against the atrocities in the neighbouring country," he said.
Debbarma alleged that people of minority communities who have been living in Bangladesh for hundreds of years were being attacked in a systematic way so that their land could be grabbed.
Tipra Motha is a part of the BJP-led government in Tripura, which shares a border with Bangladesh.
