2013-07-07 : [ Further ] Update on Compensation for Ram Sharan’s Family

Dear all,

    While we had the good fortune of the visit of the first citizen of the republic along with the sight of bare bodied-bare feet teenagers toiling to make his visit as smooth as possible, Samtuliya also visited Kanpur once more this week. Here is a very brief report based on our conversation with the visiting party:

1.  Samtuliya, with her suckling baby (and this time without the two toddlers), along with her brother and petty contractor’s brother, arrived at the Kanpur station at 11.00 pm on Tue, 2nd July and stayed at the railway station in the night.

2.   Morning 10.00 am they reached the labour court and by noon she was given a check of Rs. 1.79 lakhs.  

3.    Another check of 50,000 was given to one Rehman, supervisor of Ramky, the main contractor. This check, it seems, is for the amount that was paid to the family at the time of the death. But according to the family, while the contractor made the family sign on a receipt of 50,000 at that time, the family got only 20,000 for cremation, the rest, they were told, had been spent by the contractor in transporting the body to Ramsharan’s home in Katihar. We have been trying to obtain documentary evidence from the labour court for this payment but have not been successful so far. It also needs to be noted that in the first meeting of HM with the director in December, we were assured that this 50,000 is over and above the compensation amount.

4.   The rest of 3.85 lakhs will be paid to the family after one and a half months, the total compensation amount being Rs. 6.14 lakhs. As we understand, this amount will be in the form of NSCs in the name of the three children. Thus Samtuliya has to make at least one more trip, her 5th from 1000 km distance for the compensation for her husband’s death while working in the campus.

    It also needs to be noted that after we made our previous update public on the 22nd June, both the institute authorities and the labour officials became active and on 26th June itself her payment orders were passed by the labour office, ostensibly without all the papers for which she had been sent back the last time on 16th June. We are aware that some of the community members called/ wrote both to the IITK authorities and the labour office after our update and it might have pushed them into action.

Hamara Manch