Station masters put off hunger stir

Association to wait for the outcome of talks with management

Railway station masters have postponed a hunger strike they planned to begin from December 10 midnight demanding easing of their work pressure.

All India Station Masters Association general secretary E.K. Babu said here on Thursday that the strike was put off in the wake of the talks being held between the association leaders and the Railway management in the presence of the Regional Labour Commissioner, Chennai.

Mr. Babu said that hundreds of station masters in the Southern Railway would go ahead with the agitation if the talks failed.

The hunger strike was proposed for three days from December 10 midnight. All station masters, irrespective of being on duty or not, were to join the hunger strike.

Their demand

“We chose December 10 for our agitation as it is the World Human Rights Day. We are protesting against the policy of reducing the number of station masters in such a way as to seriously affect the safety of the Railways,” said Venugopal, Palakkad Railway Division president of the All India Station Masters Association.

More than 2,000 station masters in six divisions of Southern Railway were to join the hunger strike demanding appointment to hundreds of vacant posts. As many as 570 station master posts are vacant in the Southern Railway and 78 of them are in Palakkad division.

Mr. Babu said that they were being forced to do continuous duty, even without a weekly off, at several stations in the country. The workload for station masters has increased manifold, he said.

Among the demands raised by the station masters are sanctioning of inter-divisional transfer, sanctioning of modified assured career progression (MACP) without delay, appointment of station supervisors at all stations, and setting up of rest rooms for station masters.