Mid-day meal workers up in arms over demands and to gehrao CM’s residence at Lambi on April 2

Rallies will continue till demands are met : Rajesh Watts

Mid-day meal workers up in arms over demands and to gehrao CM’s residence at Lambi on April 2

Ferozepur, March 29, 2016: Members of the Mid-Day Meal Office Employees, Cooks and Workers’ Union,  working under the Mid-day Meal Workers Society on contract basis, today announced to register their protest pertaining to their long-pending demands with gehrao of Chief Minsters’s residence at Lambi on April 2.

Expressing over the step-motherly treatment by the Punjab Government, Parveen Sharma, State President said, the commitment of arranging meeting with the Chief Minister immediately after the budget session, has proved           false despite the fact that Ropar Rally fixed for March 6, was cancelled.

Levelling charges against the government, he said, there is a lot of difference between ‘saying and honouring’ which could be measured from the economic exploitation of the mid-day meals employees and workers.

Elaborating on their demands, the union members said office employees recruited under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan (SSA) and the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyaan (RMSA) were selected almost at the same time as the Mid-Day Meal office employees.

Even seven years of service, the employees are still living below the poverty line and the cook workers are working at the meager wages of Rs.35 per day.

He furthers said despite the fact that the selection criteria was also the same, the SSA RMSA office employees had been getting salaries according to the revised pay scale since April 2014, but the MDM office employees were still waiting for their turn to get the same.

He added that despite the fact that the selection criteria was also the same, the SSA RMSA office employees had been getting salaries according to the revised pay scale since April 2014, but the MDM office employees were still waiting for their turn to get the same. They argued that while the neighbouring state of Haryana was paying its cooks Rs 2,500 per month and in Chandigarh, the cooks were being paid a monthly salary of Rs 2600, in Kerala it is Rs.6000, in Tamilnandu Rs.7500 and in certain states like Lakshdeep  and Pondicherry Rs.9000 per month, the Punjab Government was paying the cooks a meagre salary of Rs 1,200. When the cooks demand a hike in salaries, the state government holds the Central Government responsible for the low salaries.

They said the state government was making them work at an average daily wage of only Rs 35, which totals to only Rs 1,200 per month by contributing only Rs.200 as its own share.

Rajesh Watts, Press Secretary informed that till such time their demands are not met out, the rallies will be organized to protest against the Punjab Government in every corner of the state.