Will KCR heed to court advice at least now?

With Telangana high court giving a strong direction to the state government to call the leaders of employees’ unions of Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) for talks on Saturday morning, all eyes are on what chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao would do now.

The high court asked the state government to begin the talks with RTC unions at 10.30 on Saturday and conclude the same within three days.

It asked the government to report the outcome of the negotiations to the court by October 28, when the next hearing takes place.

The high court expressed strong objections to the stubborn stand taken by the chief minister in dealing with the strike of Road Transport Corporation (RTC) employees.

It also warned that there would be revolt from the people if he continued with the same stand.

More than 48,000 employees and workers of the RTC have been on strike since October 5 in pursuance of their demands, which include merger of RTC with the government and revision of their pay scales which had been pending since 2017.

However, KCR so far displayed an adamant stand on the RTC strike, stating that 48,000-odd striking employees have been dismissed and there is no question of holding any talks with the employees’ unions.

The Joint Action Committee of the RTC employees’ unions called for a Telangana shutdown on Saturday. All the opposition parties and several trade unions extended their support to the shutdown.

Even auto rickshaw unions and cab operators including Uber and Ola declared that they would be off the roads in support of shutdown.