Bengaluru: The Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL), on Sunday, June 3 said that they have decided to bring in staff from Kochi Metro to make sure there are no interruptions in the operations, as the staff of Namma Metro had threatened to go on an indefinite strike starting today, June 4.
The movement of metro trains went on as usual today, as the BMRCL had taken action to ensure that the strike did not affect the commuters in any way. Starting from 5.30 am, leaving from the first station, the trains traveled in all four paths.
Late last week, 900 of the 1500 employees of Namma Metro decided to boycott work on Monday and participate in the strike that was called against the BMRCL as their demands remained unfulfilled despite several court ordered meetings between the parties. Some of the demands that the employees had made included salary hike, abolition of contract system, promotion and exclusion of Metro from the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA).
Vice-president of Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Employees Union (BMREU), Suryanarayana Murthy has said that a call on the strike would be taken based on the hearing to be held this afternoon in the High Court.
Commenting on the BMRCL’s decision to call on the Kochi Metro staff to aid in conducting the services, Murthy said that it would not work and even alleged that attempts were being made to use untrained staff in the event that the strike goes into effect.
Trying to put fears to rest, BMRCL Managing director Mahendra Jain said that they have enough staff on duty to ensure that operations continue and added that Kochi Metro staff have arrived to handle things in the event of emergencies.
Apart from having 60 trained staff to run the trains and handle the back-end, Jain said that they had written a letter to the home department, asking for additional forces to make sure that commuters have a hassle free travel.
According to sources, if there is to be a strike, it would most likely begin late on Monday night.
Upwards of three lakh people use the Namma Metro to commute during any given day. One of the commuters said that the ambiguity regarding the situation was worrying because she uses the metro services to go to and from work everyday.
