Tharoor urges Centre to reconstitute joint consultative mechanism within ISRO, Dept of Science

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor urged the government on Monday to reconstitute a joint consultative mechanism within the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Department of Science (DoS) to ensure a democratic way of dealing with issues of employees. The Thiruvananthapuram MP said this during the Zero Hour in the Lok Sabha.

"There is an urgent need to reconstitute a joint consultative mechanism within the ISRO and the Department of Science. The JCM was introduced by the government as a negotiation mechanism for employees in government offices as far back as 1963. In case of the ISRO and the DoS, a reverification process is supposed to take place every five years, wherein employees can vote and elect two recognised service associations to the governing and administration councils of these two premiere bodies," he said.

"The elected service association is qualified and recognised to participate in the JCM for a period of five years. However, the last verification process took place in 2014 and there has been no attempt to reconstitute in the past nine years under the present government," Tharoor added.


He added that as a result, there is currently no suitable forum to raise the legitimate and pending issues relating to the employees' welfare, working conditions and benefits.

"This naturally has had an adverse impact on the morale of the employees, who feels disenfranchised by the lack of a consultative platform to air their grievances. I urge the government to initiate the process so there is a democratic way of dealing with the issues of employees," the Congress leader said.

Meanwhile, Aparupa Poddar, the Lok Sabha MP from West Bengal's Arambagh, touched upon the issue of vacant seats in educational institutions that are reserved for the Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBC) categories.

"It is evident that we are far behind in fulfilling our commitment towards their inclusion in the society. It is the constitutional duty of the government to ensure the livelihood and social upliftment of these communities," she said.