GIFT TO CHENNAI MAYOR:Neel Metal Chaps make a stinking statement

By G Saravanan

Published in The New Indian Express, Chennai on October 25, 2011:

Source:http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/Neel-Metal-Chaps-make-a-stinking-statement/326715.html

CHENNAI: Even before taking up the mantle of Mayorship in Chennai, AIADMK’s Mayor-elect Saidai S Duraisamy has received a Deepavali ‘gift’ from Neel Metal Fanalca — a city stinking with heaps of garbage.

An unannounced mass absenteeism, over unpaid Deepavali bonus, by Neel Metal Fanalca’s (NMF) 2,500-odd employees for more than a week coupled with the new assignment for the Corporation’s 10,000-odd sanitary workers during the civic body elections has created garbage mounds across the city.

NMF is responsible for removing garbage from four zones — Triplicane (zone-6), Adyar (zone-10), Kodambakkam (zone-8) and Pulianthope (zone-3). While, civic body staff are entrusted with the remaining six zones.

However, garbage removal operations have been hit for the last two weeks in those four zones, as NMF workers began striking seeking immediate disbursement of Deepavali bonus.

NMF management convinced workers to return to work and promised payment within a week.Later, it backtracked from its promise and asked its employees to get their bonus in two installments afterward.

When bonus was not released even after the second promise, NMF workers refused to go on the streets, resulting in garbage pile up at several locations.

Since a sizable number of the Corporation’s sanitary staff were roped in as ‘support staff’ during civic body elections, garbage removal in the other six zones (except VIP areas and posh localities) has also been hit.

NMF sources said, the on-field strength of staff has dwindled to 200 against the actual strength of 2,500.

NMF has been able to move only about 400 metric tonnes of garbage during the last two weeks against its daily average of over 1,700 mt. Sluggish work by civic body’s sanitary staff  (after elections) has also added to the problem.

Though authorities have deployed its men and machinery to remove tonnes of garbage piled up at NMF’s four zones, the city is still stinking of garbage.