Around 12,000 non teaching staff went for a day long agitation today of all the seven IITs to protest “anomalies” in their pay package. They did without boycotting work.

The reason for the agitation was that their demands were not yet met even after last month’s meeting with the IIT Council which is the apex body to take decisions on IIT matters. The All IIT Employees Union has been demanding for the implementation of the new promotion scheme with effect from May 1^st 1998 and better pay package for the Group-D staff.

The general secretary of the union, Mr G S Kohli said that they had held meeting with the IIT Directors earlier who had agreed to our demands. But it was unfortunate that the IIT Council meeting did not take up the matter seriously yet.

The All IIT Co-Ordination Committee had met here last month and had requested the IIT directors to take up the matter at the IIT Council meeting. The Council meeting discussed the issues but referred it to a separate committee for further consideration.

Mr Kohli said that it appears that this is to be delaying process in resolving our case and it is not acceptable.

He added that hence they were forced to go for a day long dharna. But they did not boycott their work. The staff joined the dharna when they did not have any work.
The employees who participated in the dharna included the technical staff, laboratory staff and office assistants

Meanwhile, IIT Kanpur Registrar Sanjeev Kasalkar termed the agitation “illegal” and appealed to the employees to return to work.