The Delhi University Colleges Library Employees Association (DUCLEA), has organised a protest at the Arts Faculty and have also notified that libraries will be shut across the University if their demands aren’t met.
The Delhi University Colleges Library Employees Association has organised a protest this week against the Vice-Chancellor (VC) of the University to demand the implementation of an approved report.
The protest has been going on since the 19th of this month at the Arts Faculty. DUCLEA members had given a four-day notice to the University officials, after which they organised a meeting of the working committee of the Association. After deliberation, on the 22nd of August, they decided to continue the dharna for 3 more days.
The University had made a committee to look into the demands of the Association earlier this year. The committee members reached a consensus that the demands of the Association are very valid and had submitted their report to the VC as well. The Registrar, however, has not taken any action regarding the report.
The demands are for the proper implementation of recruitment rules and for all employees to receive the same benefits, regardless of being in a college or university library.
The recruitment rules were brought in to provide security to the library employees who have been working for 20-30 years on the same post and the same pay scale and have not been getting the benefits of promotion. According to Mr Yogender Tiwari, the General Secretary of the DUCLEA, Rather than implementing the new rules, the University is in favour of direct external recruitment. This will fill up all the vacancies which will prevent the already existing workers to enjoy the promotion.
DUCLEA has also put up demands against the recovery of salaries from the employees. In conversation with DU Beat, Mr Tiwari said, “In 1998-1999 the university gave pay scales passed by the EC. Now in 2015, the university has notified for the recovery of the salaries. The retiring employees have their recovery touching 7-10 lacs. When pay scales were passed and approved by the EC back then, their recovery is baseless. Moreover, the Supreme Court also passed a ruling which states that the recovery of pay scales passed over 10 years ago cannot be taken wherein the revision of pay scale and reducing salaries is allowed, but recovery from backdating is prohibited.”
According to DUCLEA Vice President, Mrs Shalu Wadhwa, the Association is being told that the report will be implemented in subsequent Executive Council (EC) meetings however four such ECs have yielded no action taken in the matter. A few demands regarding a 2400 pay scale had been taken up by the EC (on June 28th, 2019) after being approved by the University Grants Commission (UGC) (on February 15th, 2019) but these have also not been implemented yet. The Association also argues that timely implementation of orders directed by the UGC as well as the Ministry for Human Resource Development (HRD), should have been done by the EC.
The Association members also mentioned that in its defence, the EC officials keep saying they don’t have time or staff for the task but according to Mr Yogender Tiwari, “All they have to do is notify the colleges to implement the decisions, which can easily be done through the website.”
If they don’t get a positive response, the DUCLEA is planning on closing all the libraries across the university to get their demands heard.
Featured Image Credits- DU Beat
Satviki Sanjay
Bhavya Pandey
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