The outsourced and contracted sanitation workers in Anantapur Municipal Corporation limits went on an indefinite strike from Monday, leading to the stopping of garbage collection and sweeping of the streets. The transport of solid waste was also affected with only a few vehicles moving out of the city and literally no garbage collection from street-corner dustbins or door-to-door collection.
There were only 135 regular Public Health workers in the city and the bulk of the work was being done by 409 Outsourced PH workers. Outside the Corporation Administrative Building in the city, the workers’ union leaders sat on a dharna and its members ensured that all the vehicles were stopped and none participated in the sanitation work. The main streets, however, received attention with some nominal number of regular staff sweeping them.
Outsourced workers asked the State government to immediately fulfill all their demands and pay a minimum of Rs.20,000 as monthly wages as per the PRC Recommendations and demanded regularisation of their services.
At Kurnool, however, there was no impact at all as about 150 metric tonnes of garbage was collected and transported to the dumping yard, said Municipal Health Officer M. Bhaskar Reddy. “The union here is affiliated to the YSRCP, hence there was no strike call and only a token strike was conducted by the AITUC and CITU affiliated members in some wards out of 650 outsourced sanitation workers. There are 300 regular employees in Kurnool Corporation, who took care of the entire work,” Dr. Reddy explained.
At Tadipatri, one of the cleanest towns in the State, the impact of the strike was minimal, though 135 Outsourced employees went on strike. The Municipal Commissioner Vasuri Mallikarjun told The Hindu that it had employed 35 new daily wagers to perform some of the emergency duties in place of the 135 workers. “We have 58 permanent staff, who along with the 35 daily wagers ensured the impact was less than 30% by ensuring no clogging of drains was there or solid waste thrown outside the bins was properly lifted,” he added.
