Conservancy workers regularised

The State Government has issued orders to make permanent 766 temporary conservancy workers of the Coimbatore Corporation. The civic body said that orders for regularising the workers were already received.

The workers would be given the orders at a grand function to be organised by the Corporation on February 19.

The Corporation had been going through a period of suspense over the regularisation of the workers, in the run up to the implementation of a solid waste management project under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission.

The waste management project would be implemented at Rs. 96 crore and this involved door-to-door collection of garbage. Faced with the need for more conservancy workers, the Corporation had contemplated privatisation of garbage collection and disposal. But it ran into resistance from certain sections of councillors on the grounds that a garbage collection fee levied by private operators would burden the people. They wanted the civic body to increase the number of conservancy workers and procure more equipment, bins and vehicles to remove garbage.