Persuade employees to end stir: CM to CS

HYDERABAD: In an attempt to break the strike of government employees, chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy has asked the principal secretaries of key departments, including Agriculture, Panchayat Raj, Rural Water Supply, Municipal Administration, Rural Development, Energy, Medical and Health and Social Welfare, to initiate a dialogue with the employees’ representatives.Chief secretary Pankaj Dwivedi accordingly called a meeting with the principal secretaries and spoke to the collectors of Telangana districts to end the impasse.The chief minister gave the direction as it might become difficult for the government to provide relief to the farmers who are reeling under the impact of prolonged dry spell.As crop cutting experiments and enumeration need to be taken up to help the affected farmers, the government has initiated the process to persuade employees of the key departments to call off their strike.The chief minister’s direction is being seen as an attempt to strike the iron while it is still hot with Sakala Janula Samme slowly easing with employees of the RTC, Singareni and teachers calling off their strike.As the key to restoring normalcy in the state hinges now on making Telangana staff call off their agitation, the chief minister is reportedly bringing pressure on the officials as well as the cabinet sub-committee to hold talks with the union leaders to find ways to end the strike. Though the union leaders are not as aggressive as they had been earlier in the wake of pressure from within to give a break to the strike, they are yet find a proper reason to call off their Samme.Towards this end, the government might help them by providing a sweetener and it is expected that by the end of the week, they might call off their strike.In Telangana region, over 40,000 educational institutions, government junior colleges and gurukuls have reopened making 52 lakh students busy with studies.As many as two lakh teachers are attending duties, the government sources said.In APSRTC too, normalcy has returned with the corporation being able to run its full complement of 8,000 bus services in all the Telangana districts.