Move to declare postal strike illegal

By Sandeep Dikshit

NEW DELHI, DEC. 12. Spurred by the Delhi High Court's observations, the Government machinery was activated today to tackle the eight- day-old postal strike. The Communications Ministry adopted a carrot and stick policy - holding talks with unions and offering them minimal concessions on the one hand, and sending a proposal to the Law Ministry seeking to declare the strike illegal, on the other.

Sources said the Government felt it was wrong on the part of the employees to go on strike while conciliation proceedings were on in the labour court. It has, therefore, sought the Law Ministry's advice on declaring the strike illegal. The possibility of imposing the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) could be explored after receiving its advice.

At a 90-minute meeting between senior postal officers and federation leaders, the Government offered to call the three lakh extra departmental agents either ``rural postal representatives '' or ``rural postal-persons''. On pension to the agents, the Government offered to transfer the Rs. 30,000- severance amount to a group pension scheme for being administered by the Life Insurance Corporation. However, it was unwilling to revise the pay scales of departmental employees and, instead, offered to refer all the issues to yet another committee.

The federation leaders rejected the offer. The issue of changing the name of the ED agents would no doubt remove the stigma, but the fight was for a better status to the three lakh rural postmen, said Mr. G. K. Padmanabhan and Mr. R. L. Bhattacharya, heads of the two biggest postal federations. The Government's offer to refer all demands concerning the departmental staff to another panel was ridiculed on the ground that an inter- departmental committee had already examined those demands during the last one year. ``There is virtually no progress. We will review the situation tomorrow,'' they said.

Addressing a news conference later, the Communications Minister, Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan, declined to say whether the Government was considering imposing ESMA. ``We will report to the High Court tomorrow and place all facts before it. We will act according to the court's decision.'' He felt that the offer to change the name of ED agents should be considered a big achievement but there was ``no question'' of the Government granting them pensionary benefits.

Spelling out the problems in meeting the demands relating to the departmental staff, Mr. Paswan said, ``I have said from the beginning that the issues are not serious enough to put the nation to hardship. I am fully sympathetic to the employees but I am helpless.''

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