Nagapattinam, Tamil Nadu: Sanitation workers, cleanliness guards, and drivers affiliated with trade unions launched an indefinite strike in Nagapattinam on Monday demanding the regularisation of their services, a statutory minimum living wage, and an immediate halt to the privatisation of sanitation work.
The strike, organised under the banner of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), saw municipal and local body workers assemble outside the Nagapattinam Municipality office to stage demonstrations and press their six-point charter of demands.
With workers abstaining from work, garbage began piling up across residential neighbourhoods and commercial areas in the coastal town.
The protesters' key demands include the permanent absorption of all contract, daily-wage, and outsourced workers; discontinuation of handing over civic maintenance to private contractors; implementation of a fixed monthly living wage; provision of compassionate appointments for the kin of deceased workers; disbursal of pending allowances for hazardous duty performed during the COVID-19 pandemic; and strict compliance with Employee Provident Fund (EPF) and safety gear provisions.
Speaking during the agitation, Selvi, a municipal sanitation worker, highlighted the disparity in wages and the hazardous conditions endured by sanitary staff.
"We have been working for 12 to 15 years, yet our jobs have not been made permanent, nor are we given adequate wages. Successive governments promised regularisation upon coming to power, but nothing has changed. Even liquor shop employees are paid Rs 30,000, whereas we, who risk our lives sorting through garbage with our bare hands, are not even provided protective gloves," she told reporters here.
Addressing the demonstration, former MLA Nagai Mali urged the state government to immediately initiate tripartite talks with trade union leaders. "Sanitation work is permanent and indispensable in nature, yet keeping the workers temporary for decades is bizarre and unjust. The government's attempts to privatise these essential municipal services must be stopped immediately," the former MLA said.
