The Nainital district conference of the AICCTU affiliated ASHA health workers’ union concluded in the Press Club in Nainital on 21 May 2015.
Addressing the conference, the national Vice President of AICCTU, Com. Raja Bahuguna said that the central government wanted to pulls its hand off the responsibility of the ASHA workers who formed the axis of a fundamental sector such as the health sector. By putting the entire responsibility for ASHA workers on the state, the centre government was creating crisis for the ASHA workers. He added that the governments in this country had only one slogan for the women workers- “Jam kar lenge pura kaam, nahin milega pura daam” (Will fiercely take full work, and not give full wages). The leaders speaking at the conference pointed out that the Uttarakhand government was a pro-mafia government that sacrificed the interests of the workers at the behest of the mafia and hence a united women workers’ movement should be built and intensified in Uttarakhand so that that government can be forced to work on our agenda. The state President of Uttarakhand ASHA Health Workers’ Union, Kamla Kunjwal said that it was only by building a unity among the union members and developing a feeling of a collective leadership that we could fight the- anti women policies of the state and the central governments. She added that it was on the basis of unity and struggles of the union that the state government had been forced to provide an annual incentive amount and in future also, on the basis of this we could win the fight for the monthly wages. A new district team of ASHA workers’ union and office bearers were also elected during the conference.
