Taking tough action against the protesting female contractual employees of emergency helpline UP 112, the Uttar Pradesh government, besides registering a case against them, also removed ADG Ashok Kumar late on Tuesday night.
Kumar was attached to the DGP office while ADG (Administration) at DGP headquarters, Neera Rawat, was appointed as the new ADG of UP 112. She was directed to take charge immediately.
The contractual female employees of UP 112 were staging a demonstration outside its headquarters, demanding job security and a salary hike.
In the transfer order, the Director General of Cooperative Cell, Anand Kumar, was also shifted and given charge of DG, Crime Branch and Crime Investigation (CB-CID) department. So far DGP Vijay Kumar was holding the charge of CB-CID.
Meanwhile, Vijay Kumar was made full-time DG of Vigilance Establishment. He will continue to look after the charge of director general of police till a permanent officer is posted.
Earlier, hundreds of contractual call takers at the emergency UP 112 services staged a protest. Lucknow police used mild force and shifted them to Ambedkar Udyaan. The contractual workers, who are communication specialists at UP 112, were expressing their anger over the issue of job loss due to change of outsourcing companies.
The protest that started on late Monday continued even after ADG UP 112 Ashok Singh assured the protesters that their jobs would not be affected.
“No call taker has been removed. They have had some misunderstanding. Negotiations are being held. Till now, call takers were hired in UP 112 through Tech Mahindra Company. After the contract ended on November 3, We Win Company is taking over the work,” the ADG had stated.
“Call takers are now skilled workers, and they will not lose their jobs. As per the rules of the UP government, call takers are now considered skilled workers. If there is any misunderstanding, it will be resolved,” he added.
Meanwhile, in the first tweet, former chief minister of UP and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav posted a picture with a copy of a letter written to him by the workers. “This is not the pain letter of any one communication officer of 100, but of everyone. Even before meeting the chief minister, the sisters and daughters who sat in the cold all night and made their demands were taken into custody in the morning. The true form of BJP’s worship of women is ‘Nari Bandhan’,” he said in the tweet.
“We demand our salaries to be increased from the current Rs 12,000 to Rs 18,000 per month, two paid holidays in a month along with a government holiday in a month and security of their job,” read the letter by the workers to Yadav which he posted.
In his second tweet, Akhilesh Yadav again posted a video of the Police detainment and wrote in his X handle, “Now it has been heard that the contract of ‘Dial 100’ is also being given to a ‘dear partner’ like port, airport and railways. Those who talk about giving reservation to women are giving them detainment. Have those who changed the name changed the name of ‘Reservation’ to ‘Hirasat’?.”
“We have been sacked without any notice as we were not listening to their demands,” said a protesting woman.
