West Bengal govt employees start dharna demanding DA at with Central counterparts

Kolkata: An organisation of West Bengal government employees on Friday commenced a three-day sit-in demonstration near the state secretariat 'Nabanna' demanding release of dearness allowance to them at par with their central government counterparts.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday announced an additional four per cent DA to the state government employees from January next.

The members of the Sangrami Joutha Mancha sat on the dharna near the 'Nabanna', where the chief minister's office is located, with placards and posters and shouted slogans in support of their demand for release of DA at par with central government employees.

The Sangrami Joutha Mancha members claimed that even after the announcement by the chief minister for an additional four per cent DA to state government employees, there would remain a 36 percentage points difference between the DA of state government and central government employees.

The Calcutta High Court on Thursday gave conditional permission to the organisation to hold the demonstration at Nabanna bus terminus near the state secretariat in Howrah city for three days from Friday.

Justice Rajasekhar Mantha directed the petitioners to adhere to their undertaking to ensure that there is absolutely no disruption to any traffic or any inconvenience to the public at large.

The court also noted that the petitioners also agreed to restrict the number of persons participating in the sit-in demonstration to 300.

The court directed that the commissioner of police, Howrah will be entitled to put in restrictions in addition to those already available on the website of the police applicable for all demonstrations in the city.