HRPF Demands to Regularize Government appointed Daily Wagers
Udupi: Human Rights Protection Foundation, Udupi is determined to move Court on behalf of the Daily wagers who were appointed in various Government Departments and are not yet regularized in spite of the apex court’s decision that Daily wagers who have served ceaselessly for 10 years should be regularized.
Briefing to Media persons on Wednesday, January 31, Dr Ravindranath Shanbhag President, Human Rights Protection Foundation, Udupi said that the Supreme Court had relied on the exact same principle in awarding payment in the case of Akku and Leela who had toiled incessantly for 42 years in the Government Women’s Training Institute for a meager salary of Rs 15 per month. After 16 years of judicial battle, they were granted arrears of Rs 27,00,000/- along with retirement benefits. Now 9 such Daily wagers who have already worked for three decades are pleading to be paid similarly based on the same decision.
Breach of Court orders
The workers should have been appointed in the same post as provided by the government, they should have required educational qualification, they should have served continuously for 10 years and in the tenure of 10 years there should not have been a stay order from any Court of competent jurisdiction, were the four stipulations to be fulfilled as decided by the apex court. There are records of 248 such temporary workers who had fulfilled the said four conditions and were regularized by the government of Karnataka in the past 12 years. This includes 184 workers from the Commercial Tax department, 28 from the youth empowerment department, 4 from the Zilla panchayat, 3 from the forest department and 16 from the health department. In spite of submitting all these documents to be used as precedent, the district administration of Dakshina Kannada was not “convinced”!
Whom did they ever wrong?
In the landmark decision by the constitutional bench in the Supreme Court, the circular was passed containing clear conditions that “The workers should have been appointed in the same post as provided by the government, they should have required educational qualification, they should have served continuously for 10 years and in the tenure of 10 years there should not have brought any stay order from any Court to continue their service.” If 248 workers could get regularized based on this circular, what wrong had these 9 persons from the D.K district done to not avail the same?
Complaint to HRPF
After several unsuccessful attempts in corresponding with the appropriate authorities in the past 12 years, these workers approached HRPF Udupi in 2014. HRPF approached the former DC of DK district A B Ibrahim and showed him the documents of all the 248 persons who had been regularized as per the apex court decision.
Same symphony!
In spite of all this, no action was taken. The district administration washed its hands of the matter yet again by directing the revenue department to take “suitable action”. When we approached Dr Jagadish, the successor of Ibrahim, the only response ever received was a few blank nods.!
In spite of being eligible, these nine workers are deprived of the salary due. Out of them, Niranjan Acharya of Beltangady Taluk Office is already retired. The rest of them namely, Gulabi, Sumati Bai, Vijaya Kumari, Satya Shankari, Yogini, Anita, Ranjani and Netrakshi Alva have served for three decades and are on the verge of retirement. The Organisation has decided to move the court in this matter until these workers get the deserved arrears in salary along with their retirement benefits. In case there are others who are in need of justice in this matter, they may approach the organization.
