Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari has said if any state government employee faces action for participating in Friday'sstrike demanding parity in dearness allowance, the BJP will stand by that person.
“Multiple unions of government employees have called a strike tomorrow(Friday). Our state president (Sukanta Majumdar) has already extended the party’s moral support to those who called the strike. The government employee and teacher wings of our party are fully supporting the strike,” Adhikari said on Thursday. The leader of the Opposition has been asking the representatives of the agitating government employees to switch sides and get affiliated to the BJP.
“As the leader of the Opposition, I want to say that if any individual participating in the strike faces any problem for doing so, we will stand by them. If a government employee is transferred or a teacher is punished with a break in service or if he is not allowed to enter the workplace the next day, please come to us,” Adhikari added.
Adhikari’s appeal, according to sources, stems from the BJP’seagerness to appropriate the ongoing agitation for the DA parity. Although there has been a BJP union for state employees since 2014, the party has failed to garner their support still enjoyed by the Left-backed Coordination Committee.
The BJP leader had said earlier that the CPM could only organise rallies for the DA parity but the BJP — in power at the Centre — could actually fight the legal and administrative battles necessary to ensure that the demand was fulfilled.
Told about Adhikari’s promise, CPM state secretary Md Salim said on Friday that the leader of the Opposition must first clarify why BJP-ruled states had taken from central and state government employees the right to call strikes.
The Left Front had issued a statement on March 4 in support of the strike.
Responding to the state government’s notices debarring employees from participating in Friday’s strike, Salim said such measures would not crush the will of the movement.
“The state government had on one occasion even arrested the agitators. Could it break their spirits? No. Whatever steps the government has been threatening with will not stand in a court of law,” Salim said.
“What else can they do? They will engage Trinamul goons to prevent employees from agitating. Today, some employees were threatened in Dinhata. But nothing will stop these people anymore,” added Salim.
The Trinamul Congress appealed to the state government employees not to join the strike.
Trinamul state general secretary Kunal Ghosh said the employees must remember that even members of their families benefited from numerous welfare schemes of the state government.
“I believe they will not do something that hurts people,” he said.
“This movement is biased and politically motivated. Those who are demanding the DA parity must ask the Centre to clear the enormous dues to Bengal first,” Ghosh said.
