After two weeks of abstaining from work, the contractors of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) relented on Friday and announced that they were calling off the strike.
The GHMC Contractors’ Association, during a media conference on Friday, said Commissioner D. Ronald Rose had acquiesced to their demand for payment of long pending dues.
Earlier, the Association had claimed that the dues amounted to ₹1,350 crore since May last year, and refused to take up any new works till the dues were cleared. The GHMC was in a fix as pre monsoon and monsoon emergency works would be affected with the strike. Several rounds of negotiations failed before a truce was arrived at.
“The commissioner has agreed to pay forthwith, ₹300 crore of dues up to August last year, and arrange for a loan of ₹500 crore through Trade Receivables Discounting System for the dues up to December last year. Based on this promise, we have decided to call off the strike,” president of the Association A. Rama Krishna Reddy said.
No bids were received for many of GHMC’s tenders even upon recall, with the 3,000-odd contractors on strike since May 18. For second recall of several tenders, May 31 was the deadline.
