DA arrears: Joint forum of state govt employees sends strike notice to Bengal chief secy

Kolkata, Feb 24 (IANS) Signalling a direct confrontation with the West Bengal government on the issues of pending dearness allowance (DA) arrears, joint forum of state government employees on Friday sent a notice to state chief secretary H. K. Dwivedi of observing a total strike on March 10 on this issue.

The total strike on that day, according to a representative of the joint forum, will be extended versions of the two-day pen-down strike that the state government employees observed on Monday and Tuesday.

"Even during the pen-down strike, which is completely different from regular strike, the state government cautioned us of 'dies non' that means break of service. Pen-down strike means abstaining from work even after coming to office and marking the attendance. But a total strike will mean not attending office at all. So, we are sure that a similar notification threatening dies non will be issued again. Hence, we have given an advance notice to the state government to send a signal that come what may, we will not move away from our strike call unless our demands for unpaid DA arrears are fulfilled," the joint forum's office bearer said.

Initially, the call for strike was given for March 9. However, in view of the examinations conducted by West Bengal Board of Madrasa Education on that day, the forum deferred the strike to March 10.

A hearing on DA arrears is scheduled at the Supreme Court on March 15.

Recently the state government has announced an additional three per cent DA for the state government employees. However, that could not satisfy the agitating employees who claimed that even after this additional three per cent DA, the gap of the state government employees with that of their counterparts in the Union government remains 32 per cent.