Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:
Reddy Company got a contract for garbage collection in the city for seven years. The company's contract will end in February 2026. Last week, 1,100 workers of Reddy's company threatened to go on strike for want of minimum wages. With the intervention of the municipal corporation, the strike did not occur. The company has agreed to provide the minimum wage to workers starting in March 2025. In an attempt to avoid reaching the point of paying the minimum wage, the company has already staged a drama, claiming that it is incurring losses.
In 2019, the municipal corporation appointed Reddy's company through a tender process. It is paid Rs 1,860 for collecting 1 metric tone (MT) of garbage; on average, 450 metric tons of garbage is collected in the city daily. The company's monthly bill amounts to up to Rs 3 crore. The city has over three lakh property owners, and it is the company's responsibility to collect garbage from every home, shop, and office. However, for the past six years, the company has not been collecting 100% of the door-to-door garbage.
Earlier, the municipal corporation repeatedly instructed the company to increase the number of garbage vehicles (ghantagadis), but the company ignored these requests. In many colonies, these garbage carts do not even come, leading to garbage being dumped on the streets. Now, the company's workers have raised the issue of minimum wages. According to this, each worker will need to be paid a salary of Rs 15,000 to Rs 16,000, including PF and ESIC benefits. Until now, the company has been paying its employees only Rs 9,000 to Rs 10,000, effectively exploiting them.
'Red Carpet' for the company
In 2019, the municipal corporation provided free land at 10 locations for the company to park its vehicles. The civic administration also allowed the company to use 50 garbage trucks from its fleet, free of charge. The company was paid on time every month. Even when the company added stones and soil to increase the weight of the garbage, the municipal corporation tolerated it.
Company to face consequences?
The company worked with the mindset that only the municipal corporation needs the garbage collection services. Why is the company incurring losses now, and not earlier? The condition for providing the minimum wage to workers was included in the tender process itself. Not increasing the number of garbage trucks is a major mistake by the company.
New tender to be issued soon?
The Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Municipal Corporation (CSMC) administrator G Sreekant said, “ In the new year, a new tender will be issued for garbage collection. The tender will be issued keeping in mind the experiences so far. After the tender process, the concerned company will be given six months to prepare the vehicles.”