The Congress party on Sunday slammed the in-charge Managing Director of Telangana Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) for his allegation that the Opposition parties were conspiring to destabilise the government, in his affidavit. Taking strong objection to the allegation, state party chief and Nalgonda MP Uttam Kumar Reddy called the allegations baseless and demanded an independent inquiry. He dared the Telangana government to prove the allegations or dismiss the MD.
“This is an extraordinary situation. It is a serious matter. The chief justice should take cognisance of this and order an inquiry by an independent agency,” Uttam Kumar said.
Sunil Sharma, the in-charge Managing Director of TSRTC while appealing to the High Court to declare the strike of the TRSTC workers as ‘illegal’, claimed that the agitating TSRTC union leaders appear to have acted with the connivance of opposition parties with an underhand motive to destabilise the government.
Uttam said that if the government had any evidence of a conspiracy to destabilise the government, it should take action. “Arrest us if you have any evidence or dismiss the official from service,” he told Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government.
Further, Uttam said that he will lodge a complaint with the Department of Personnel and Training of the Government of India against Sunil Sharma, and threatened to take up the matter in Parliament during the winter session beginning from Monday.
Similarly, BJP state president K Laxman, accused Sunil Sharma of serving more as a worker of the ruling TRS party than as the MD of TSRTC. Laxman said that the MD should resign if he fails to prove the allegations. He too threatened to file a complaint with the Department of Personnel and Training, according to Deccan Chronicle.
Meanwhile, the indefinite strike by over 48,000 employees of RTC entered the 44th day on Sunday.
Though the TSRTC Joint Action Committee (JAC) has temporarily dropped the main demand of TSRTC's merger with the government, the latter has given no indication of any imminent talks to break the impasse. Sunil Sharma said in his affidavit that the employees may again raise the merger demand in future.
The Telangana High Court will resume hearing on the petitions relating to the case on Monday. At the previous hearing, the division bench headed by Chief Justice RS Chauhan refused to declare the strike illegal and at the same time also declined to issue orders to the government to hold talks with the employees.
With IANS inputs