DA hike demand: Govt employees’ pen-down strike over CM ‘thieves’ barb

“All those dacoits and thieves who had bagged government jobs by producing a chit (during the Left Front regime) are now occupying the stage at the DA protest site. Do I have to take lessons from these dacoits and thieves?”

Banerjee purportedly said during the second day of the protest on March 30.
The government employees have been protesting against the state government to press for their demand for a hike in DA for over two months in Kolkata.

Joint Forum of State Government Employees member Bhaskar Ghosh said, “The gathering of March 30 (during a massive rally by the protesting government employees) was one of the largest in the history of the state.

Such protests are not only for employees, but also for candidates who did not get jobs due to the (WBSSC) recruitment scam. Mamata Banerjee also staged a dharna against the Centre’s deprivation towards Bengal, but we realised that her 30-hour protest was against the government employees.” He added, “On March 30, Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari along with other Opposition leaders joined our protest and assured us help.

But Mamata Banerjee compared us to thieves and dacoits. We are protesting against such comments and will be joined by employees and teachers from all departments of the state. We are going to observe a pen-down strike on April 6. This will be followed by a two-day protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi on April 10-11.”

Another member of the Joint Forum of State Government Employees, Chandan Goray said, “It has been 65 days since the protest began. On April 6, we are going to observe a 12-hour pen-down strike because CM Mamata Banerjee termed us as ‘Thieves and Bandits’. We only wanted our dearness allowance (DA) from the state government at a rate that the central government provides. We thought the CM would try to resolve the issue, but without resolving it, she criticised us by calling us thieves and dacoits.”

(The writer is an intern with The Indian Express, Kolkata.)