K Chandrasekhar Rao lets RTC staff join duty

Hyderabad: Giving relief to TSRTC workers, who have ended their 55-day-old strike and are waiting to return to work, Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Thursday said the Cabinet had decided to give them a chance to resume duty unconditionally. He also hiked fares by 20 paise per kilometre from Monday.

Incidentally, Friday marks 10 years of the day Mr Rao called off his fast in 2009 during the agitation to demand Telangana statehood. The RTC staff had gone on strike on October 5, and had twice ignored deadlines set for their return to work.

While announcing the decisions taken at the Cabinet meeting, Mr Rao invited the RTC workers to resume duty from Friday morning. He appealed to the temporary staff not to attend duty and said they would be given a chance in the future. He thanked them for serving the people when the RTC workers were on strike.

Stating that “RTC workers are our children,” Mr Rao said the Cabinet had decided to release `100 crore as immediate relief to the RTC and permitted the management to incre-ase fares by 20 paisa per km to fetch an additional income of `752 crore. The new fares will come into force from Monday.

The Chief Minister announced that the government will provide a job to each of the family members of RTC workers who died during the strike.

Stating that the government had nothing against the RTC workers, Mr Rao said that they had dragged their families on to the road by falling into the trap of the unions. He said that the unions and Opposition parties were responsible for the suicide and deaths of RTC workers.

The Chief Minister said the government would not recognise RTC trade unions. In future, it would talk directly to the workers not with the trade union leaders who, he said, had messed up the RTC issue.

Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao cautioned the RTC workers that if they took this chance lightly, they would be responsible for any consequences.

Lashing out at BJP MPs for their dual stand on the Motor Vehicles (Amend-ment) Act, he asked if they had ever got funds from the Centre to save the RTC.

Referring to the BJP MPs’ demand regarding the Centre’s share in the RTC, the Mr Rao said, “We will give notice to the Centre and we will also go to court if required to get funds from the Centre. We will certainly dig out the accounts of the RTC with regard to the Centre’s share.”

He said Opposition parties played cheap politics during the RTC strike. “They are not really concerned. They tried to get some political benefit,” he said.

Mr Rao said CJ Ragha-vendra Singh Chauhan had showed real concern for the RTC workers when the two met at Raj Bhavan during the Constitution Day celebrations.

“He told me that RTC workers were poor people and asked me to show some sympathy towards them as the law had limited scope to get involved in the RTC strike.”

He said each RTC worker would be informed about the actual financial position of the corporation, He would invite the workers for lunch and discuss with them the measures to make the RTC a more sustainable and profit-making unit.

Regarding privatisation of RTC routes, Mr Rao said that the government’s plan was different and the Opposition was making false and misleading statements.