Disciplinary proceedings started against employees responsible for stalling metro services: DMRC to HC

Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) told the Delhi High Court that it has started disciplinary proceedings against its employees who were responsible for stalling services after an altercation with CISF personnel in May this year.

The DMRC yesterday told a bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar that stalling of metro services not only indicated misconduct, but also violated the service rules for which action has been initiated.

The submission by the Delhi metro came after the court on July 5 had suggested penal action against protestors who stall metro rail services or dump garbage on the roads, causing public inconvenience.

"All of them should go to jail," the court had said referring to such protests.

The court was hearing two PILs, one initiated by it regarding the dumping of garbage on the roads by protesting employees of New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) and another seeking action against those responsible for the alleged stalling of metro train services in the city on May 31.

The metro services were disrupted for a few hours on Delhi Metro's Blue Line, following a scuffle between DMRC and Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) staff over a parking issue at the Dwarka Sector-21 metro station in southwest Delhi.

According to the petition by Puran Chand Arya, the scuffle occurred around 12.30 pm on May 31 after the DMRC and CISF staff got into an altercation when a tyre of a vehicle, apparently belonging to the CISF, was "deflated" by the DMRC staff as it was parked in an "unauthorised zone" outside the premises of the metro station.

The PIL, initiated suo motu by the court, dealt with the May 24 agitation by NDMC's contractual sanitation workers who had dumped garbage outside prominent government buildings like the Shastri Bhavan and the Rail Bhavan in Lutyen's Delhi, demanding regularisation of jobs and better wages.

In the garbage matter, the president of the Joint Action Committee of NDMC filed his response indicating names of the cleaning staff who were responsible for dumping waste on the roads as a mark of protest.

The court listed both the matters for further hearing on September 18.