The Jammu and Kashmir Awami National Conference today criticised the state government for "failing" to fulfill its commitments towards the demands of employees and asked political parties to work out a solution acceptable to both the parties.
"All political parties need to come forward in hammering out a formula to the satisfaction of the aggrieved employees. We criticise the coalition government for failing to handle the employees' issue properly and also use of force by the Omar government," Senior vice president of Awami National Conference (ANC), Muzzarfar Shah told reporters in Jammu.
He said the government had entered into an agreement with the representatives of the government employees on payment of their arrears, removing pay anomalies etc, but it backed out from its own promise forcing the employees to go on strike.
"If the Government was aware that it had no resources to meet the demand of employees on the arrear front, why did it enter into an agreement with them?", he asked.
The government should have envisaged in advance, that it would not be able to find the funds to meet these demands, the ANC leader said.
About 4.5 lakh state government and PSU employees are on strike from April 3 and have extended their stir till April 13 demanding release of Sixth pay commission arrears and enhancement of retirement age from 58 to 60.
The coalition government had on April 5 imposed Essential Service Maintenance Act (ESMA) in the state.
