The Water Transport Workers’ Congress of the Kerala State Water Transport Department withdrew from their indefinite strike launched five days ago on Tuesday.
The decision to withdraw the strike was taken following the talks held with Transport Minister Aryadan Mohammed at Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday.
“We decided to call off the strike because the Minister has promised to consider our demands and raise our daily wages from Rs 225 to Rs 618. He told that the rest of our demands will be considered,” said Water Transport Congress state president Nazar Paigamadam.
Nearly 400 workers from thirteen depots had taken part in the state-wide strike held from October 5. In the various depots, many services were cancelled owing to the lack of employees. Also, he stated that the department has garnered a loss of Rs 10,000 in the past four days owing to the strike.
“There were hardly any ticket collectors at any of the depots. Nearly hundreds of passengers had travelled without taking tickets. The daily wage employees consist of nearly 60 per cent of the total workforce in the department. The officials had falsely stated that the services will be unaffected even if the employees go on a strike,” he said.
In the strike, a majority of the laskers, drivers and ticket collectors expressed their solidarity with the rest. Meanwhile, the employees have also lodged a complaint alleging that the KSWTD officials had hired retired hands and drivers who did not have a license to run these services.
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