Over a month late, almost all employees of the cash-strapped East Delhi Municipal Corporation have been paid their salaries for January this week.
EDMC Commissioner Amit Yadav said on Thursday: “We have managed to clear the January salaries of 95 per cent of our staff, except Group A officers, through internal resources.”
Also on Thursday, a teachers union protesting the delay in payments ended its strike. East Delhi Mayor Meenakshi said she assured the teachers that the civic body would try to disburse February’s wages soon. Though seven teachers were on hunger strike since Wednesday, many more had supported their protest at the EDMC’s headquarters in Patparganj.
The BJP-led civic body has been undergoing a financial crisis for months now, but it has had a deficit since its creation in 2012. Some of the 27,000-strong staff had claimed they were not paid for three months.
The Mayor told The Hindu on Thursday that repeated attempts to meet Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal to ask for help had yielded no results. “He hasn’t agreed to meet me, and I was asked to attend a Janta Durbar to raise the EDMC’s grievances. But, now the Chief Minister is on leave, so we don’t know when the problem will be solved,” said Ms. Meenakshi.
The Corporation’s annual expenditure on salaries, pensions and other benefits comes up to Rs.1,200 crore, while its income from parking fees, conversion charges, property tax etc. comes to Rs.900 crore. Officials say a subsidy or grant of Rs.600 crore from the government would be required for the civic body’s functioning.
