M A I N   N E W S

Two strikers’ leaders held

LUCKNOW, Jan 22 (PTI) — Hardening its stand, the Uttar Pradesh Government today arrested two leaders spearheading the movement against the trifurcation of the state electricity board and said the process of fresh recruitments begins from tomorrow, and at the same time held out the promise of out-of-turn promotions to “loyal workers”.

After the failure of three rounds of talks yesterday, the police in a late night swoop arrested two top leaders - Shailendra Dubey, convener of the Uttar Pradesh Powermen Action Committee and A.K. Singh, office-bearer of the Engineers Federation and terminated their services. The National Security Act was also invoked against them, state Power Minister Naresh Agarwal told newspersons here.

He said those terminated from service would not be taken back and that advertisements would be published in tomorrow’s newspapers inviting applications for fresh appointments.

In a fresh swoop since yesterday as many as 400 striking powermen were arrested taking the total number of those arrested to 6,279 so far, Mr Agarwal said, adding that the services of 117 more strikers were terminated today.

Issuing a stern warning, he said: “If the strikers decide to end the strike before January 23, we might be able to accommodate some of their demands on service conditions but after that date all negotiations would be on our terms...The government was ready to dispel all their fears regarding service conditions but rolling back power reforms was out of the question.”

Employees were returning to duty and a total of 19,000 have already resumed their work, Mr Agarwal said.

The striking engineers, he said, were banking heavily on the token strike called by Northern India Federation of Power Engineers on January 23 midnight.

The government, the Power Minister said, would make ad hoc appointments on technical posts while new appointments for clerical posts would be of permanent nature. The last date for filing of applications was January 28.

The striking leaders spokesman said that the employees were not perturbed by the announcement of fresh recruitment by the state government claiming it was filling up 25,000 posts which were lying vacant.

Claiming that there was all-round improvement in the power situation, he said the state imported 2,600 mw of power while its own generation stood at 1,750 mw today.

An official note said the Army continued to assist at key power stations in operating control rooms and handling plants.

The Army authorities are monitoring the activities at all plants in close coordination with state officials, the note said, adding that one more plant of 210 mw at Anapara, power generation unit no 13 at Obra and one plant at Tanda have been rejuvenated during the past 24 hours.

Meanwhile, a contempt petition was listed to be taken up by the Lucknow Bench of Allahabad High Court next week regarding the harassment of the family of the striking powermen.

In a show of solidarity with the striking powermen, the UP Bank Employees Union and Northern India Railway Union today held a rally in the state capital today.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister A.B.Vajpayee sent his aide, Shiv Kumar, to study the situation in UP. Mr Shiv Kumar met Urban Development Minister Lalji Tandon, who represented the government in the talks with the power employees.

Mr Agarwal, however, denied Mr Kumar had anything to do with the strike. Mr Kumar used to visit Lucknow often as it was the Prime Minister’s constituency, he said.