Terminated BSNL workers get their jobs back

GANGTOK, 20 Dec: All the twenty-two Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited [BSNL] employees engaged as casual and contract workers, whose services had been terminated recently, will be joining work and their still awaited wages for two months disbursed “as soon as possible”, assured BSNL, Sikkim, General Manager Arvind Bajaj, while speaking to the press in his office here today.
This announcement came after the protesting employees finally managed to meet the GM today. Mr. Bajaj had been on leave for the past week and joined office only today. The protesting employees, who have been making rounds of the GM’s office for the past several days, managed to finally meet him today, and as expected, a heated exchange of words followed.
Casual and contract workers from all over the state had ‘gheraoed’ and sat on a dharna at the office of the GM at Baluwakhani this morning seeking direct answers regarding what they see as their ‘illegal’ termination from duty and their pending wages.
At present, a total of 22 employees, who had been with BSNL had their services terminated since 15 November without prior intimation or a formal notice. The workers were waiting for the GM with whom they wanted to speak directly regarding the matter since he had been allegedly ignoring the pleas of the workers for over a month.
The demands of the employees were that all the terminated employees be reinstated and be employed either under contractual basis or regularization keeping in view their service record and the tenure of their service. The employees had demanded ‘Job security’ and want BSNL to ensure that all guidelines as prescribed by the GoI related to pay scale and other benefits for casual and contractual workers be followed without ‘monopolizing’ the administrative structure.