BOMBAY, 12 March 2005 — The Congress party-led Democratic Front government in Maharashtra plunged into crisis yesterday when three ministers belonging to the Nationalist Congress Party resigned.
The three — Minister for Higher Technical Education Suresh Dada Jain, Labor Minister Nawab Malik and Rural Development Minister Vijaykumar Gavit — tendered their resignations to party chief Sharad Pawar.
The ministers resigned following their indictment for corruption by the Justice P.B. Sawant Commission. They quit ahead of the tabling of the commission’s report in the state assembly on Monday.
Meanwhile, more than 45,000 workers from Bombay’s state-run transport company went on strike yesterday to protest proposed salary cuts, as authorities struggled to run backup services for millions of commuters in India’s financial hub.
Commuters carpooled or took taxis and trains to work after employees of the Brihanmumbai Electricity Supply and Transport Undertaking, or BEST, kept some 3,200 buses off the road, demanding higher wages. A government commission had offered increased perks in talks with the union, but an overall cut in wages.
Some 157 conductors and drivers reported for duty yesterday out of a staff of about 7,000, and 90 buses made their rounds early in the day. But most of those were pulled off the road after striking workers threw stones at them, leaving three drivers and two conductors with minor injuries, said BEST spokesman A.S. Tamboli.
The strike was called after talks failed Thursday, though officials were still trying to persuade the union to limit the labor action. Sharad Rao, general secretary of the BEST workers’ union, said the strike was “total and indefinite.” The BEST also distributes electricity produced by two power companies, but there was no disruption in electricity because some workers in those units did not join the strike.
