Pay salaries to RTC staff by Monday, orders HC

Hyderabad: The High Court of Telangana on Wednesday took serious objection to non- payment of salaries and directed the TSRTC management to pay pending salary for month of September to the striking RTC employees by Monday.

Telangana Mazdoor Union has filed a petition in the High Court and requested the court to give directions to the RTC management for payment of salaries to the striking employees immediately. Hearing the petition, the judges questioned the RTC management for the delay in releasing salaries to nearly 49,000 employees who were on strike.

The advocate on behalf of the RTC management has informed the court that the delay in payment of salaries was due to lack of staff, following the strike. The advocate has also said that the management will provide salaries to the employees by Monday.

The court, while posting the next hearing to Monday, has instructed the management to complete the process of giving salaries to the workers by that time. It may be mentioned here that Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao had issued instructions that all striking RTC employees are deemed to have been dismissed from their service and the salary will be disbursed to the 1,200 RTC workers only who attended their duties regularly.

The workers have gone on strike on October 5 against the state government's indifference towards resolving the long-pending issues, including merger of the corporation with the government.