Preneet Kaur meets Punjab food minister
Thursday, 23/07/2015
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PATIALA: Local MLA and former minister of state (MoS) Preneet Kaur called on Punjab food minister Adaish Partap Singh Kairon on Wednesday and raised the issue of palledars who had been agitating at Patiala for many days against the non-payment of their dues for the labour work carried out by them during wheat procurement operations.
Kaur pleaded with the minister that the issue deserved to be sorted out on priority, for most of them were in dire need of money to fund their children’s education at various levels, besides other obligations.
The food minister assured her that the matter would be sorted out without any further delay. In her presence, the food minister also spoke to the Palledar Mazdoor Union leader on phone and advised them to meet certain officers who he said had been given suitable instructions in this regard.
On Tuesday, Preneet Kaur had visited the agitating labourers at the dharna site and had received a memorandum from the district coordination committee of Palledar Mazdoor Union from Patiala. She gave the memorandum to the food minister, which listed, interalia, the main demand that the agreement reached between the district authorities and the palledars on April 26, 2015 regarding work to be given without tenders and payments to be made to palledars/labourers directly and not through contractors, should be implemented in to-to.
It must be mentioned that until this Rabi season, the entire labour activities/works were allotted to the palledar unions’ contractors after inviting tenders. But from this season, the loading of produce filled bags from the mandi yards on to the trucks was assigned by the government to the arhtias and that too without tenders and a flat rate of Rs 1.50 per bag was fixed to be paid to the arhtias – as against Rs 1.09 which used to be earlier paid to the palledars through contractors.
There was a mass-protest by palledars/labourers against it and the wheat procurement operations remained stand-still until an agreement was reached between the palledars and the government.
