K Chandrasekhar Rao showers sops on RTC staff
Five workers’ representatives from each of the 97 depots took part in the meeting. They also had lunch with the Chief Minister.
Hyderabad: Stating that he would act as a brand ambassador of TSRTC, Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Sunday announced several reliefs and welfare measures for employees including an increase in retirement age.
Addressing the employees at a special interactive meeting at Pragati Bhavan, Mr Rao said that they would have employment security and not one of them would be sacked and no private bus will be permitted to operate on any RTC route.
Five workers’ representatives from each of the 97 depots took part in the meeting. They also had lunch with the Chief Minister.
The Chief Minister announced that the September salaries would be paid on Monday. The salaries for the strike period will be paid at one go later on. He said the retirement age of RTC employees and workers would be increased from 58 years to 60.
Desiring that the RTC become a profit-making institution in four months, Mr Rao said that from next year the government would allocate Rs 1,000 crore in the Budget to the TSRTC. If the RTC earned Rs 1,000 crore profit, each of the employees will be given Rs 1 lakh as a bonus, he promised.
He assured the government he would provide a job to a person from each of the families who lost a member during the strike period and `2 lakh per family will be paid as ex gratia.
The Chief Minister did announce some constraints. He declared that there will not be elections for the RTC recognised unions for two years. An employees’ welfare board will be constituted with two employees for each depot and a committee will be formed to give suggestions to solve the problems faced by the women employees.
Mr Rao appealed to the officials and employees to take a pledge that they will work in coordination to protect the RTC and he will request TRS ministers, MPs, MLAs, and MLCs to travel by RTC at least once in a month.
When Mr Rao said that if need be, employees should work an extra hour and a half per day, the employees expressed their acceptance by applauding.
The meeting was emotional and the two-hour session was held in a congenial atmosphere. It was marked by the use of local idioms and jokes which evoked peals of laughter from the audience.