Employees failing to report to duty for days or weeks altogether was common in the KSRTC Ernakulam depot but now workers are more punctual. Authorities started slapping fine of Rs-200 from the regular absentees. An article about this from Deccan Chronicle.
The reason: the management is slapping a fine of Rs 200 for a day’s absence. Frequent absentees would also face actions like termination of services. They have already prepared a list of employees who shirked workin the last six months.
“In one case an employee suddenly disappeared from duty in November and came back on January 23. In the past, we ignored such cases due to staff shortage. But we can no more tolerate this behavior as on an average six to eight services had to be cancelled because of staff shortage,” an official said.
“The provision to take action was there in the rule books but till now we’ve taken a lenient view and the strict enforcement is for the first time.”
The top authorities are aware that the drive may result in some of the employees quitting the job. “We have already alerted the employment exchange about 500 possible vacancies and the recruitment process will start next month.”
The main reason why the employees regularly “bunk” from duties was the low wages paid by KSRTC . A light motor vehicle driver in the government service draws a starting salary of Rs 14,200.
For his counterpart in KSRTC it would take 12 years to get the same salary. “So many take up temporary jobs and vanish from duty. A bus is operated in pair (a driver and a conductor), so the absence of one of them results in cancellation of the trip,” the official said.
Image Credits: Seemakk
