The UP State Road Transport Corporation has once again extended the date to announce a decision on the fate of family members of corporation employees who died in harness, a spokesperson told Hindustan Times.
As a result some next of kin have vowed to resume a protest at the gates of the UPSRTC headquarters from September 1.
The list of next of kin who stand to get jobs in the UPSRTC has now grown to 998 beneficiaries in nearly six years, with the corporation having stated last month that the approved list would arrive by August 15.
The long wait had prompted beneficiaries to stage a week-long protest in mid-June earlier this year, which is when the SRTC had announced that the final plan of action will be shared after August 15.
Now, however, the date has been extended to August 31, for the umpteenth time in these last six years.
Under a state government scheme, all departments are required to maintain a list of those employees who are sole bread earners of their families, in order to be able to offer another able member a job in the same department.
According to the scheme, the UPSRTC can only hire next of kin of deceased employees, if the corporation is making profits. According to Corporation authorities, this is the reason for the long wait the family members have endured. According to UPSRTC records, the Corporation had been running at a loss till last year.
M. Venkateshwar Lu, principal secretary, UPSRTC, had said that since Covid-19 the profits made by the department drastically dropped, disabling them from creating jobs for these 998 people.
However, also according to the UPSRTC records, approximately 130 crore worth profit has been made in the last financial year.
Ajit Singh, technical manager, UPSRTC, said that the reason for the continued delay now is different: although the proposal has been presented and the audit and approval process was slated to be completed by August 15, the determining state government meeting got delayed, due to which the beneficiaries have to wait another 15 days, for now.
Interestingly, even the SRTC authorities are not sure whether the amended date is fully confirmed.
A few beneficiaries have been informed of this delay. They had earlier ended their week-long protest in July after being assured of the final announcement to be made after August 15.
Now, however, two of the beneficiaries have confirmed, namely Akashdeep Singh from Meerut and Shivam Kumar from Aligarh, that the protest will be escalated and resumed at the gates of the UPSRTC headquarters on September 1, should the corporation default again.
