Municipal workers on Wednesday threatened to extend their strike to South and North Delhi, even as employees in East Delhi resumed work after a five-day agitation for salaries.
Apart from timely salary payments, South and North Delhi municipal employees are also demanding regularisation of jobs for contractual workers and cashless treatment at government hospitals.
Sources said the representatives of about 40 unions will meet on Thursday to decide the course of action.
However, workers in some parts of North Delhi started their protest on Wednesday. Delhi Nagar Nigam Safai Mazdoor Sangh president Sanjay Sitara said safai karamcharis in Karol Bagh, Civil Lines, Narela Zones in North Delhi struck work on Wednesday.
“We are demanding timely salary payments and permanent jobs for contractual staff. Sanitation workers in South Delhi may also join us in the strike,” said Vikram Dikka, a representative of North Delhi Municipal Corporation employees’ union.
Sanitation workers in the East Delhi Municipal Corporation were on strike since March 27, but most unions called off the stir on Tuesday after officials agreed to their demands of cashless medical treatment and regularisation of posts.
A union leader from East Delhi, Mukesh Gahlot, said though EDMC workers had called off their strike, the employees would support the agitation in other parts of Delhi.
“All unions, including sanitation staff and ward boys in hospitals, are meeting on Thursday. We will take the demonstration forward from there. We will throw garbage outside the homes of the Chief Minister and the Prime Minister,” said Mr. Gahlot.
The EDMC resumed cleaning on Wednesday, with spokesperson Y.S. Mann saying the situation had “returned to normal”. Garbage that was dumped on streets as a sign of protest was cleared and dhalaos were cleared of the accumulated trash.
EDMC commissioner Amit Yadav said all 154 auto tippers of Shahdara (North) Zone were deployed and 54 tractor trolleys were used to collect garbage. In Shahdara (South) Zone, 43 trucks and eight loaders were deployed.
As of 2 p.m. on Wednesday, the EDMC had picked up 2,000 metric tonnes of garbage and sent it to the landfill site at Ghazipur.
