Chandigarh: A score of commuters were left stranded across Punjab on Monday, the day one of the three-day strike by contractual employees of Punjab roadways and PRTC to press their demands including regularisation of their jobs.
There are said to be about 2,800 buses of Punjab roadways and PRTC, which kept off the roads. According to some media reports, the buses’ operation had been suspended from late last night onwards.
The passengers were thus compelled to shell out more money to reach their respective destinations by private buses and other modes of transportation such as taxis.
A large number of commuters could be seen at all the bus stands with Monday being a holiday on account of Guru Gobind Singh’s birth anniversary.
The Punjab roadways, Punbus and PRTC contract workers’ union leaders said that there were about 8,000 contractual employees who were taking part in the strike and held demonstrations at all the 27 bus depots in all the 23 districts across Punjab.
They also held that the protesters would also march towards chief minister Bhagwant Mann’s residence here on Tuesday. They held that aside from regularisation of their job, the contractual employees demanded a 5% annual salary hike, reinstatement of suspended workers and end to the outsourcing recruitment.
However, senior officials said that buses were being operated by regular employees who had reported for duty and efforts were on to further streamline the operations.
