No thermal plant employee to be sacked: FM
Saturday, 21/10/2017
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BATHINDA : Amid protests by employees of the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) against the closing of Guru Nanak Dev thermal plant here, Punjab finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal on Friday made it clear that no employee of the plant will be retrenched.
Punjab finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal interacting with people during a function to mark Vishwakarma Day at Bathinda on Friday.
Talking to the media during a function on the occasion of the Vishwakarma Day here, he said that even after the closure of the thermal plant, none of its employee , be it permanent or contractual, will be retrenched from the PSPCL.
“At one point, the PSPCL had about one lakh employees but now it has 40,000 employees. In any case, it has shortage of employees. Hence, no employee will be retrenched due to the closure of the thermal plant. The plant’s infrastructure will remain as it is and it will be made functional whenever the need be, as per the requirement of power,” he said.
The employees of the thermal plant have been staging protests against its closure. They recently alleged that some employees on contractual basis have been retrenched.
To a question, Manpreet said the Congress victory in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha polls and the Gurdaspur Lok Sabha bypoll will have positive impact on the party prospects not only in the assembly polls in the neighbouring Himachal Pradesh but across the country.
