Coimbatore Corporation conservancy workers, affiliated to the Kovai Mavatta Ooraga Valarchi Ullachi Thurai Oozhiar Sangam, staged a protest at the Corporation premises in Town Hall on Tuesday.
Led by Member of Parliament P.R. Natarajan, the workers urged the State Government to provide them housing facilities and the Corporation to not privatise the conservancy work.
They also complained that the Corporation paid the workers on contract less than what the government paid workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. After the expansion of Corporation area, the challenges for conservancy workers had increased.
With shortage of workers, there were problems galore on the garbage collection and disposal front. The CITU leaders, including C. Padmanabhan, U.K. Sivagnanam, also said that while the AIADMK government had announced housing facilities for police personnel and various other development works for all but not the conservancy workers.
The union’s efforts to highlight those had failed to evoke the government’s response. Around 100 conservancy workers participated in the protest.