Contract workers’ records: Zagade promises action against errant officials

The order came after the PMC failed to furnish information on the pending wages of 58 contract labourers of the water supply department. The order,passed on February 20,had asked the PMC to furnish the information about the contract labourers to SIC by March 5.

The PMC had given the contract to Surat-based Enviro Control Associates (India) Private Limited for constructing a sewage treatment plant near Bhairoba Pumping Station in the 1990s.

The 58 contract labourers have been working as valve men since 2001 and their last wages were Rs 3,675 per month. “According to the Minimum Wages Act,we should be getting Rs 7,500 per month,” said Raju Shelar,one of the contract labourers.

When the labourers decided to move the court,their counsel advocate Ajay Patil and Sachin Palse filed an RTI application in the PMC asking for records of their attendance and payment of salary,employment provident fund (EPF) and Employees State Insurance (ESI) given to the workers by the contractor. “The PMC furnished incomplete information in the beginning and later submitted the contractor’s reply of all the provisions of labour law being complied by it. We then filed an appeal with the Information Commissioner of Pune division saying the information furnished to him by the PMC was incorrect and contradictory to that obtained from the Provident Fund (PF) office in Surat,” Palse said. He said that the total outstanding amount to be paid to the 58 labourers between 2001 and 2009 was Rs 29.74 lakh.