SP supports what Quran says: Azam Khan on Triple Talaq Bill

New Delhi, Jun 13: Petrol price on Saturday was hiked by 59 paise per litre and diesel by 58 paise as oil companies for the seventh day in a row adjusted retail rates in line with costs since ending an 82-day hiatus in rate revision.

Petrol price in Delhi was hiked to Rs 75.16 per litre from Rs 74.57, while diesel rates were increased to Rs 73.39 a litre from Rs 72.81, according to a price notification of state oil marketing companies.

Rates have been increased across the country and vary from state to state depending on the incidence of local sales tax or VAT.

This is the seventh daily increase in rates in a row since oil companies on Sunday restarted revising prices in line with costs, after ending an 82-day hiatus.

In seven hikes, petrol price has gone up by Rs 3.9 per litre and diesel by Rs 4.

The freeze in rates was imposed in mid-March soon after the government hiked excise duty on petrol and diesel to shore up additional finances.

Oil PSUs Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL), instead of passing on the excise duty hikes to customers, adjusted them against the fall in the retail rates that was warranted because of a decline in international oil prices.

New Delhi, Jul 21: Air India trade unions have complained to Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Puri that the government has now turned a blind eye to the management's ethnic cleansing at lower levels through compulsory leave without pay (LWP), redundancies and wage cuts.

In a letter to Puri, the Joint Action Forum of Air India unions said, "We are deeply ashamed to say that it seems that after praising our Air Indian Corona Warriors at grand functions, respectfully, the government has now turned a blind eye to this management's ethnic cleansing of Air Indians at the lower levels, through compulsory LWP, redundancies and wage cuts."

The Joint Action Forum of Air India unions strongly opposes this Compulsory Leave without pay scheme as it is an illegal practice and is not a voluntary scheme.

"In fact the Board resolution itself empowers the Chairman and Managing Director with extraordinary powers, which seem akin to a High Court, to pack off employees on 2 years leave (extended to 5 years) at CMD's discretion or at the arbitrary whim of the Regional heads," the trade unions said.

"This said Compulsory LWP scheme violates every labour law put in place by Parliament and orders of the Supreme Court and various other courts and seeks to dispossess the lower categories workers of their legally guaranteed rights," it added.

The trade unions have pointed out that the redundancies are at the elite management cadre level and not the workers.

"We are indeed shocked that the management of Air India could prepare and formulate a scheme for compulsorily sending workers on leave without pay, which is akin to an illegal lay-off, under the garb of a Leave Without Pay, when ironically the redundancy actually lies in the upper echelons of management and not with the humble workers of Air India, who have slogged to make our Airline the treasure it is," they complained to Puri.

"It must be noted that out of 11,000 permanent employees, our management occupies almost 25% as Executive Cadre, with little or no accountability. Solely amongst the Elite Management Cadre, we have 121 top officers ranking from DGMS, GMs, EDs to Functional Directors, most of whom are either performing duplicate job functions or are indeed redundant and not to mention the retired relics serving as consultants and also the CEOs of various subsidiary companies," they added.

Trade unions said the redundancy or compulsory leave without pay scheme if any at all, has to apply only to these Executives, more so, when they do not even have protection of labour laws or Supreme Court orders.

Strangely, the topmost corporate executive cadre and the backroom Generals, have saved themselves from the axe of wage cuts, by sacrificing a piffling of a few grand, whilst the frontline warriors of flying cabin crew, engineers, ground staff have borne the biggest brunt head on, the unions said.

Patna, Jan 12: Prashant Kishor, national vice-president of the Janata Dal (United), a key ally of the BJP-led NDA, has thanked Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi and former AICC chief Rahul Gandhi for their support in opposing CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and NRC (National Register of Citizens).

Perceived as one of the closest associates of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who is also the party’s national president, PK (as Prashant is fondly called) also assured the two top Congress leaders that the contentious legislation would not be implemented in Bihar where JD (U) is ruling the State with the support of the BJP.

“I join my voice with all to thank #Congress leadership for their formal and unequivocal rejection of #CAA_NRC. Both @rahulgandhi and @priyankagandhi deserve special thanks for their efforts on this count….also would like to reassure to all – CAA/NRC won’t be implemented in Bihar,” tweeted PK on Sunday.

The development assumes significance as a day back, the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting, chaired by Sonia Gandhi, had strongly opposed CAA/NRC/NPR as it was aimed at “sinister design of the present regime to divide Indian people into religious lines.”

The latest tweet by PK is also being seen as a rebuff to the BJP, which again recently reiterated that “the BJP should project its own chief ministerial candidate during the 2020 Bihar Assembly elections.”

The JD (U) had taken umbrage over such provocative statements by BJP leaders and asked the saffron camp to rein in its ‘loudmouths’ as BJP chief Amit Shah had already made it clear that the next Assembly polls in Bihar would be fought under the leadership of Nitish.

Of late, PK has been quite vocal about his opposition to the Centre’s policies, particularly the contentious issues of NRC and CAA. Besides, he even dubbed senior BJP leader Sushil Modi as the man who became Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister due to ‘circumstances’ as the BJP was decisively decimated during the 2015 Assembly elections.

Nitish never reprimanded PK for his jibe against Modi, thereby giving rise to speculations whether Bihar was again heading for a political churning ahead of Assembly polls slated for October this year.