On Monday, some 8,000 contractual employees of the state-owned Punjab Roadways and PRTC went on strike indefinitely, demanding that their jobs be regularised.
Private buses, on the other hand, continued to operate throughout the state.
According to Punjab Roadways, Punbus/PRTC Contract Workers’ Union president Resham Singh Gill, more than 2,000 buses of the state-owned Punjab Roadways and Pepsu Road Transport Corporation (PRTC) stayed off the roads.
Many passengers who normally rely on state-owned buses were inconvenienced by the indefinite strike action.
Employees protested in a number of locations, raising chants against the state government for failing to meet their long-standing requests.
If their demands were not met, they threatened to lay siege to Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh’s home in Siswan, Mohali, on Tuesday.
According to Gill, in July and August, they were told that their demand for regularisation would be honoured. Despite the fact that two cabinet sessions have been held since then, the concerns have not been resolved, he noted.
Aside from employment security, the demonstrators want the fleet size to be increased from roughly 2,500 buses to at least 10,000.
