There is no clarity on whether the RTC employees will go on strike from the midnight of February 6. The representatives of the employees’ unions say they are geared up for the strike, but the final word has to come from the PRC Sadhana Samithi.
The employees have already submitted a memorandum to the RTC Vice-Chairman and MD informing him of their decision to strike work from February 6 in support of the government employees, who have been agitating against the “injustice done to them in the PRC.”
“After the merger of RTC with the government (AP Public Transport Department), we seem to be neither here nor there. In the past, our pay scales used to be revised once in four years, unlike the government employees, whose pay used to be revised once in five years. Now, we have also been made a part of the government, but our designation and cadre have not been fixed so far. The government plans to revise the tenure for the PRC from the existing five to 10 years,” say RTC JAC conveners Y. Srinivasa Rao and Valisetty Damodara Rao.
Cut in HRA
“We hear that the HRA for the RTC employees in cities like Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur and Nellore will be decreased from the existing 20% to 16% and those in smaller cities and towns like Vizianagaram and Srikakulam will be drastically reduced from 20% to 8%. It is also said that the CCA will be abolished,” says Mr. Srinivasa Rao.
“RTC employees will have more problems than the government employees if the PRC is effected. This is because while the scale and cadre of the government employees has been fixed long ago, RTC merged with the government barely a couple of years ago and our scale and cadre have not yet been fixed,” he says.
“This PRC is not applicable to us (RTC employees). Our designations have not been finalised. We are trying to create awareness among the employees in this regard and appeal to them not to join the strike,” say RTC officials, who do not want to be quoted. Both the union leaders said their decision would depend on the call of the APNGOs.
