Delhi Metro services may come to halt from Saturday

Delhi Metro commuters may face tough time from Saturday as Metro's 9,000-odd non-executive employees have threatened to go on a strike from June 30 after little headway during talks between the management and the workers. The non-executive workforce including train operators, station controllers, technicians, operations staff, maintenance staff, have been protesting since June 19 at various depots and control rooms of the Delhi Metro for revision of salaries and other issues.

The workforce play a critical role in running the Metro network and the strike may totally cripple the services. Last year too, Metro services had come to the brink of a shutdown when the non-executive staff had threatened to go on strike on similar demands. The crisis was, however, averted at the last moment after the DMRC management and staff council came to an agreement following a series of meetings.



This year, the employees are claiming that DMRC management has not kept its last year promises and they have no option left but to go on strike if demands not met. The employees are demanding pay hike, payment of arrears, right to form a union and fixed guidelines for sacking an employee only in extreme conditions.

Employees claim that there is no consistency maintained during upgradation of scales and employees are stuck in one grade for 10 years.

"Our first demand is that the DMRC staff Council be changed to a DMRC employees union as the council is not a constitutional body and so, it does not have any teeth. Other demands include implementation of our Industrial Dearness Allowance (IDA) as per the 3rd pay revision scale," Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Staff Council's secretary, Ravi Bhardwaj, said.

“There would be no maintenance of trains and trains will not be rolled out of train depots. Station controllers would ensure that entry to metro stations is also closed for public,” Bharadwaj added.

(Inputs from PTI & ANI)