Municipalities to have contract employees

jabalpur: local bodies, especially municipal corporations, are having a tough time with employees working in the posts of sweepers and cleaners. the age old system in which these jobs were assigned to a particular class of scheduled castes has now outlived its service utility. permanent employees in this sector are not proving worthy of their jobs. the service conditions as championed by trade union organisations have led to discontentment among the people, as they think precious little about the job assigned to them.the trade union interventions have actually proved to be a blessing in disguise for them. there is a regular demand for contract services in this area of work, as cleanliness is considered to be the first step towards a healthy life. this issue has been taken up by the municipal corporation of katni, where the local corporators decided to carry experiment with contract sweepers. amidst loud protests from traditional sweepers. the scheme will be on trial for three months. if this scheme proves to be a success, then such contracts would be extended to other wards of the town as the number of sweepers appointed on a regular basis have been found wanting in their duties. another point which has been considered by local corporation authorities is that of filling the vacant posts in the corporation. since the state government has placed a blanket ban on new appointments against the vacant posts and those who are in service are not performing their duties, and due to the pressure from the people, the corporators are now considering getting the work done in a piece- meal manner on contract basis. such experiments conducted by other bodies like the madhya pradesh state electricity board have produced good results in the past. the jabalpur city corporation has also introduced the contract scheme, which has helped people in getting dirt removed from their localities. cleanliness done on a contract basis not only yields better results, but also spares local bodies from the maintaining service records, provident fund, and frequent challenges of agitation and strikes.