More than two dozen contractual employees, working as toilet cleaners in various parts of the city, claim that they have not been paid salaries for past few months. Poor working conditions and extended work hours have added to their agony. These workers are struggling hard to make ends meet due to constant delay in their salaries.

A number of these workers are deployed in Sector 37, 38, 42, 43, Dadumajra and Kajheri village, in southern part of the city. Workers allege that re-allotment of work orders and change of contractors are also factors that have led to delay in salary distribution.

UT Mayor Rajesh Kalia now says that he will take up the matter with the MC officials.

“I have raised this issue on various platforms, including with Labour Court and Municipal Corporation, but have not received any satisfactory reply. In fact, a few of the workers have not received their salary for last six months. They still continue doing their job in a hope that they will get their pending money next month. Contractors, who are hired by MC to release salaries and cleaning of toilets, fail to pay them their dues. In fact, sometimes they don’t pay the entire salary and convince the employees to accept whatever they are paid. The workers are also not provided with basic cleaning-kits and are always at a high risk of infection”, said Kiran Bala, an activist who keeps taking up the issue of these workers.

These workers say they were hired by a contractor. Satish, who lives in Sector 20, Panchkula. When contacted, he refuted the allegations and said, “Whatever amount was due on my side, I have already paid to the workers. The contract has been re-allotted to some other person now”.

“My wife and I, both work as toilet cleaners. We have not received salaries for last six months. We asked our contractor many times but have not got it yet. We failed to get our child admitted in school due to poor financial conditions. I am unable to feed my family.”

“On an average, around 4,000 persons use a public toilet on a daily basis. If we do not clean these toilets, one can image the unhygienic conditions that will prevail”, one of the workers told Chandigarh Newsline, on the condition of anonymity.

Another worker added, “I have been working in Sector 38 for last three years. I am the only bread winner in my family of five. I do not have any money to feed my family. Whenever there is an official inspection, we are made to clean the toilets as early as even 4 am, be it summers or winters. Then, our duty hours go on till late night. Even the cleaning kits are not provided to us. We have to buy these kits from our own pocket.”

“A few of these workers met me and explained the entire case of delay in their salary payments. I have taken it up with MC officials. I have called a meeting with all such workers and officials of the MC, so that this problem can be resolved soon and pending salaries can be paid to the workers”, UT Mayor Rajesh Kalia told Newsline.

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