Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore   

Corporation needs 843 sanitary workers

K. V. Prasad

The sanctioned strength is 2,916 but the civic body has only 2,073 The sanctioned strength is 2,916 but the civic body has only 2,073

COIMBATORE: To ensure that its waste management programme is supported by the required sanitary workers strength, Coimbatore Corporation plans to appeal to the State Government for sanction to fill up 843 vacancies.

Though there is a ban on fresh recruitment (imposed through Government Order no.212 of November 29, 2001), the Corporation wants to make out a case for filling up vacant posts and cite as reason the need for more workers if Coimbatore has to be turned into a litter-free city.

A resolution moved in the Council on Monday was instantly approved by the members, as the Corporation's plan offered hopes of badli (temporary) workers getting absorbed. Major Opposition parties had been demanding that the 787 badlis who were with the Corporation for the last eight years should not be thrown out of jobs owing to privatisation of waste management.

A flash strike by the workers two weeks ago and resistance to privatisation in 18 wards in South Zone were born out of a lurking suspicion among the workers and a section of the Opposition that the move held out the threat of retrenchment. The Corporation assured them that when the zone came under privatisation, the sanitary workers there would be relocated in other zones.

The resolution stated that the population had increased and new layouts had come up after Coimbatore Municipality was made a corporation in 1981. This, in turn, had increased the volume of waste generated every day. (It is now put at around 800 tonnes).

The sanctioned strength of sanitary workers is 2,916 but the civic body has only 2073. According to sources in the civic body, one of the options explored is to regularise the temporary workers. The Opposition had often contended that the ban was only on fresh posts and not on filling up vacancies. They wanted the Corporation to seek Government permission to fill these. The resolution on Monday pointed out that GO had banned even the filling up of vacancies.

With a detailed explanation of the situation, the Corporation wants to place this resolution before the committee consisting of Chief Secretary, Finance Secretary and the Secretary for Administrative Reforms, to convince the Government of the dire need for more workers to create a clean city.

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