UCG Thar employees protest non-payement of salaries

Engineers demand to release pending salaries and enact Sindh Regularisation Act 2013

KARACHI: Around 450 disconsolate engineers, doctors and workers of Underground Coal Gasification (UCG) Project Thar, Energy Department Government of Sindh continued their protest, reiterating their demands to release three months' worth of pending salaries and regulate their services under the Sindh Regularisation Act, 2013.

According to Abdul Manan Larik, an engineer on the project, a cabinet meeting held on March 29 decided to direct all departments to initiate the process of regularisation for contract employees given they fulfil the criteria and are qualified.



Larik told The Express Tribune, "However, we are being denied our due right by the energy department of Sindh even though we have been working for the past eight years and almost all the employees have crossed the age limit for any new government job". Larik was one of the protesters in a sit-in outside the Islamkot Press Club in Tharparkar district. Larik said that the recruitment process for the project was originated by the energy department and duly notified by former secretary Aijaz Ali Khan in an advertisement in a leading newspaper. He said that a recruitment committee was set up as well consisting of Director General of Sindh Coal Authority, members of Sindh General Administration and Coordination Department and members of the energy department, including the UCG's project management.

The demonstrators condemned the move of the Provincial Energy Minister Imtiaz Ahmed Shaikh who diverted the attention saying that the project belongs to the federal government, whereas Chief Minister (CM) of Sindh had already directed secretary of energy department in May 2018 to initiate the regularisation of UCG project employees.

Senior medical officer at the project Dr Manik Lal said that the exploitation of Thar coal was the dream of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) former Chairperson Benazir Bhutto. Dr Lal added that former CM of Sindh Qaim Ali Shah initiated the UCG Project Thar and former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani ensured that the supply of funds to utilise Thar's black gold ingeniously was uninterrupted.

Dr Lal said that upon successful test burn, former CM Qaim Ali Shah invited the then prime minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf along with federal and provincial cabinet to visit the UCG project Thar in August 2012. Ashraf applauded the efforts of the UCG team led by Dr Samar Mubarakmand and announced release of funds along with an extra salary to all workers of UCG.



However, Dr Lal said, "It is implausible to understand that how the PPP-led Sindh government can part ways from ownership of employees and UCG Project Thar, despite being solely responsible for the execution of UCG Thar project where the role of federal government was only to provide funds."

Another employee, Ameer Bux Burdi demanded the Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Reforms Khusro Bakhtiar to restart the funding of UCG project Thar while resolving the issues between federal and Sindh government about owning the employees of UCG.

Burdi added that refusal to pay employees in drought and famine-hit Thar showed a callous disregard for basic rights.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 24^th, 2018.