New Delhi, Feb 23 (PTI) The South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) Wednesday approved a proposal to regularise its daily wage employees such as sanitation workers, gardeners, beldars who were appointed before 2009 and had been working on the contract basis, officials said.

The move comes as the city prepares for civic body polls, which are due before May.

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A notification regarding schedule of the civic election is likely to be announced by the state election commission in the second week of March.

All the three municipalities are ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is the principal opposition. Last civic polls were conducted in April 2017.

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A few days ago, the Delhi BJP had announced to regularise daily wage sanitation workers, gardeners, guards, beldars working with municipalities soon.

The proposal to regularise daily wagesemployees appointed before or by 2009 was moved by SDMC's leader of the house Indrajeet Sehrawat in the standing committee meeting on Wednesday which was approved.

Standing Committee Chairman BK Oberoi said that daily wage employees including sanitation employees, beldars played a crucial role in controlling the Covid pandemic but still they are at the constant risk of uncertainty about their jobs.

“So we have decided to permanently regularise their services and a proposal in this connection has been approved today (Wednesday). The number of such employees is less as those appointed till 1998 have already been made permanent,” Oberoi said.

He said that civic officials have been asked to ascertain the number of such daily wages employees so that they can be regularised at the earliest.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)