TURA: The week-long strike by several hundred employees of the Garo Hills Autonomous District Council (GHADC) came to an end on Friday after the chief executive member wielded the stick but failed to give hope.
The agitating body called off the strike and announced that employees would return to work on Monday.
GHADC chief Dipul Marak had threatened the protesters with legal action and termination of services of those refusing to join work.
The employees wanted the authorities to give in writing that their six months’ salary would be paid immediately but the request was rejected.
“They (the protesters) told us that they are withdrawing the protest in the interest of Garo Hills and the GHADC which was welcomed by the executive committee. They also wanted a written assurance that six months’ salaries should be immediately released but this was rejected because there are currently no funds in the council treasury,” said Deputy Chairman of GHADC Metrinson G Momin.
However, the GHADC gave verbal assurance that paying pending salary would be its top priority.
Both gazetted and non-gazetted employees have not received salary for several months now and had been appealing to the executive committee to resolve the issue. Many low-rung employees are facing a tough time to run families and some have been forced to pull their children out of school as they could not pay fees.
The leaders of the agitating body met Deputy Chief Executive Member Dolly K Sangma on Friday afternoon and informed her about their decision to withdraw the strike.
This was, by far, the longest agitation in the GHADC in recent times. The employees had organised a strike for three days last week after which they announced their indefinite shutdown of the council since last Wednesday.
It was also the first time that a ruling executive committee of the GHADC had refused to relent to the demands of the striking group.
The protest had impacted the normal functioning of the oldest autonomous institution in Garo Hills for over a week and halted revenue collection and official works, including land documentation.
On Friday, the council authorities issued a final ultimatum to the striking employees, via a notification, warning that unless they returned to work by October 1, the members of the executive body of the agitating Non-Gazetted Employees Association (NGEA) would face termination of their services and the association would also be dissolved.
“Legal course of action will be taken if the non-cooperation movement continues even after dissolution of the executive body of the NGEA,” warned the authorities.
To compensate for the loss of working hours due to the strike, Marak had directed various departments of the GHADC to utilise the services of its muster roll workers in place of the agitating employees.
