Hyderabad: Railway contract workers stage dharna

Hyderabad: Railway contract workers staged a dharna in front of Sanchalan Bhavan on Monday, demanding the officials to pay the salaries to them before the 7th of every month, but the contractors are paying salaries every two months, due to which they are facing a lot of difficulties.

Protestors pointed out that railway contract workers working in different railway stations in Hyderabad and Secunderabad divisions are suffering from many problems that include not getting salaries on time and others.

M Venkatesh, president, Hyderabad Railway Contract Workers Union, said, "There is a situation where there is no money to buy a ticket for the bus to come to the duty. Due to the lack of exact date of payment of salary, the workers who are staying in the rented houses are facing many problems with the house owners who are threatening to vacate the house and we have given many representations to the railway officials but all fell on deaf ears."

"After every month of hard work, we contract workers are forced to run around the contractor and the local railway authorities for the salary, and for the past several months, we have been struggling to manage our livelihood, It is high time now it if will better if the concerned officials of SCR pay our salaries every month, not the concerned contractors," said Ramesh (name changed), a contract worker.

"For the past several months, we have been struggling to manage our livelihood, and also, we do not have any welfare facilities that include ESI cards and PF. Whenever we asked the reason for not paying the salary on time the contractors are threatening to remove us from our jobs," said another railway contract worker.