Congress accuses Telangana government of exploiting Panchayat Secretaries

Hyderabad: AICC secretary Ch Vamshi Chand Reddy questioned the way Panchayat Secretaries are being made to work for 13 hrs and also doing the additional work of field assistants, who were laid off by the government.

He expressed concern over the physical and mental health of close to 10,000 of them, if they are forced to work on extended hours.

Speaking to media, VCR demanded the government to resolve the problems being faced by 9355 junior panchayat secretaries who were employed by the Panchayat Raj department through direct recruitment. He said that the panchayat secretaries are overwhelmed with extensive working hours starting from 7 am to 8 pm in addition to the work of the field assistants who were laid off by the government. This is severely affecting their physical and mental well-being, he said.

He further said that the secretaries are compelled to do many tasks ranging from village administration, development and welfare, co-ordination, social welfare, implementation of 'palle pragathi' programme, construction of ISLs (Individual Sanitary Latrines), registration of births, deaths and marriages, water supply, tree plantation, to village revenue and finances along with the field assistants duty.

He said it was reprehensible and disgraceful that the CM who brags about equal pay for equal work pays the secretaries a consolidated pay of Rs15,000 while they are actually entitled to a pay of Rs 32,000 under 4th-grade panchayat secretaries pay scale and is burdening them with field assistants job too which is worth another Rs10,000. "Isn't this sheer labour exploitation? Worse yet is that they are paid salaries only once in 3-4months and not at regular intervals. This anti-employee government is making their lives miserable," he said.

"I strongly demand the government to rehire the field assistants at the earliest and restructure the job specifications of the secretary post such that it abides by the maximum of 8 working hours rule under the Labour Act. I also urge the government to ensure that the junior panchayat secretaries are paid according to their work and that their salaries should be disbursed from the government treasury on a monthly basis," Vamshi said.