Delhi Metro staff call off protest over hike

New Delhi: The Delhi Metro on Sunday said its non-executive employees have called off their ongoing protest after their issues were amicably settled following meetings with DMRC managing director Mangu Singh and other officials.

The non-executive staff, including train operators, maintenance staff, station controllers and customer relation assistants, have been protesting since July 21 against the management’s alleged failure in implementing a two-year-old decision to upgrade their pay scales.

They had threatened to bring train services to a halt from Monday if their demands, including a pay hike, were not met. DMRC spokesman Anuj Dayal said Delhi Metro services would continue as per schedule on Monday.

“The ongoing protest by DMRC’s non executive employees was called off on Sunday after all the issues raised by the agitating employees were amicably settled following many rounds of meetings and deliberations with DMRC’s managing director Mangu Singh and other senior officials,” he said.

He said the issue was also deliberated in detail on Saturday in a high-level meeting chaired by secretary, ministry of urban development, D.S. Mishra, and chief secretary of Delhi government M.M. Kutty with Mangu Singh.

Secretary of staff council Anil Kumar Mahato had earlier said that Delhi Metro had in 2015 agreed, “in-principle”, to upgrade pay scale of maintainers from Rs 8,000-14,410 to Rs 10,170-Rs 18,700 from July of that year. It was also decided to merge the pay scales Rs 13,500- Rs 25,520 and Rs 14,000-Rs 26,950.

A new pay scale of Rs 20,600-Rs 46,500 was to be introduced, according to the agreement, which was decided upon following a similar employee stir, he had said.