Kurnool, July 05: Fund crunch has seen contract workers in the Indiramma project retrenched. Despite being required for the tasks at hand, the government has had to bow to the inevitable. This move has rendered 198 jobless in the district while another 243 have been thrown out of work across the State. They were employed in phases on a contract basis. As many as 373 work inspectors and 68 data-entry operators were recruited on January 19, 2007 and had been drawing salary from the Housing Corporation. Their job was to supervise construction of houses, inspect works and record payment of bills.
The dismissal came as a shock to the employees. Acting on orders, the officials axed 150 works inspectors and 48 data entry operators in the first week of June.
Even as the dismissed staff lament the hardships entailed for their families, the remaining staff have been obviously overburdened.
One person is doing the work of two, or even three, with no rise in pay.
“It is not good on the part of the Congress Government to resort to such steps after being re-elected,’’ say some employees of the Housing Department.
However, Housing District manager Ramesh has maintained that the move to trim the staff was based on the consideration that “excess’’ staff could mean corruption.
It was true, he said, that the workload had increased but stressed that those removed would not be reinducted.
–Agencies–