The Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC) Employees’ Joint Action Committee (JAC) on Sunday strongly opposed the reported proposal to recruit conductors through outsourcing and on-call arrangements instead of regular appointments.

RTC JAC State convenors Y. Srinivasa Rao and P. Damodara Rao stated in a release that permanent jobs in a public-sector organisation should not be filled through temporary or contractual arrangements. They demanded that the State government immediately issue a regular recruitment notification to fill around 15,000 vacancies in the APSRTC.

The leaders said outsourcing conductors might provide a temporary solution to the staff shortage, but would weaken the regular employment system in the RTC in the long run and could eventually pave the way for privatisation.

They said around 15,000 posts were vacant in various categories, including drivers, conductors and mechanical staff and that no regular recruitment had been conducted in the APSRTC for the past 14 years, resulting in a heavy workload on the existing employees.

The JAC leaders pointed out that passenger footfall had increased substantially following the implementation of the ‘Stree Shakti’ scheme, with daily ridership reportedly reaching around 20 lakh passengers. However, the number of buses and staff had not increased proportionately, placing additional pressure on the existing workforce.

The JAC leaders insisted that regular recruitment, and not contractualisation, was the permanent solution to the staff shortage and questioned why the government, which was filling vacancies in other departments, was not giving similar priority to the RTC, which provides transport services to lakhs of people every day.

The leaders warned that maintaining regular, contract, outsourced and on-call categories of employees performing similar duties could lead to disputes over wages, job security and service conditions, besides causing industrial unrest.

They demanded that the government and the RTC management immediately withdraw the outsourcing proposal and fill vacancies in all categories through regular recruitment. The JAC also called for the procurement of 4,000 new buses to meet growing passenger demand and urged the government to ensure that electric and other future buses be operated by the APSRTC itself.

“If the RTC is to be strengthened, the number of regular employees must be increased along with the number of buses. Contractualisation is not a solution for the future of the RTC,” the leaders said informing that a meeting with all unions would be held soon to discuss the issue and chalk out a future course of action to protect the regular employment system in the APSRTC.