Conservancy workers return to work

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The conservancy workers affiliated to various trade unions returned to work on Friday after withdrawing their indefinite strike, which commenced on Monday (October 5).

The 16-point charter of demands included revision of wages, filling up vacancies and termination of agreement with the private firm, which was entrusted with the task of lifting garbage from across the 100 wards.

The meeting held in Chennai was presided over by senior officials from the Directorate, Municipal Administration. According to CITU district secretary Balasubramanian, they were assured of certain demands, which included the issues with the private firm outsourced to lift the garbage.

The officials, it is said, had assured not to renew the contract with the private firm, which comes to close in mid-November.

The tripartite meeting also gave an assurance to study the modalities to increase the wages, the CITU leader said.

As a sequel, the workers resumed their duties on Friday and cleared the mounds of waste which had piled up on the streets across the five zones.

“It will take at least another two more days to clear the backlog. People had strewn the garbage on the streets and on dry channels and waterbodies....The dumper bins in remote locations are overflowing,” an official from the Health wing said.

The Commissioner Gaurav Kumar appealed to the residents in Meenakshi Amman Nagar in Ward 8 to segregate the garbage at source and handover to the sanitary workers as it would help speed up the process of cleaning exercise.

He visited a couple of residential areas in Kurinji Nagar in Ward 9 and Masthanpatti in Ward 40 and distributed pamphlets to the residents on Friday.

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