NL Correspondent
SRINAGAR: Normal work was badly affected at the Civil Secretariat Srinagar due to strike by the Civil Secretariat Non Gazetted Employees Union.
Hundreds of people who visit the Civil Secretariat Srinagar Monday returned disappointed without getting their works done. Even only few ministers stayed for some time and left there.
The employees held the protest inside the premises of the Civil Secretariat seeking redressal of their demands.
The President, Civil Secretariat Non Gazetted Employees Union, (CSNGEU), Ghulam Rasool Mir, claimed that the employees were staying only in 30 percent government quarters and private hotels hired for the use of employees.
“The outsiders are staying in most of the government accommodations meant for employees. These people are workers of political parties, relatives of ministers, and bureaucrats,” Mir accused and sought eviction of “illegal occupants” from government accommodations.
The president CSNGEU demanded that government should construct new quarters to accommodate all Darbar Move employees.
The CSNGEU has also been demanding detachment of attached staff from the personnel sections of ministers, commissioner secretaries, officers, settlement of rules for promotion of gazette level, issuance of notification in respect pay anomaly/ 7th pay commission, and outsourcing of canteen within the premises of secretariat.
The Government is accommodating employees in quarters of Estates Department that as per officials, are “inadequate” to meet the requirement of the employees. They are entitled for the government accommodation as per the laid down norms.
For rest of the employees, the Government is hiring private hotels and guest houses which cost crores to the state exchequer.
An official said that the Government has to provide accommodation to over 6000 employees for six months both in Srinagar and Jammu. Government had decided several times to utilize state land effectively where additional accommodation could be developed for these employees.
Meanwhile, Tasaduq Jeelani, Director Estates Department, denied that outsiders were staying in government accommodations. “Not a single political worker is staying in any of government accommodations,” Jeelani said.
Replying to a question that Government quarters were inadequate to meet the requirement of the employees, he said, all these issues of accommodation would be resolved in next few years.
“We have a proposal for construction of 400 flats at Pampore. We have taken possession of 32 flats and employees have been shifted there,” he said.
He said that the department was in the process of acquiring 150 kanals of land near Tulsibagh.
Further, he said that Chief Minister laid the foundation stone for construction of 32 flats in Jammu last year. He said the process for construction of 24 and 16 flats at two separate places in Jammu region was going on. “We have also conceived a project for construction of one block each in civil secretariat Srinagar and Jammu,” he added.
