NEW DELHI: Appreciated for being brave enough to distribute ration during the peak of Covid but facing the ire of the common man for forcing them to wear masks in public, the Civil Defence volunteers have taken everything gamely. However, working without compensation is testing their patience. Engaged now in large numbers as bus marshals to oversee passenger safety, the volunteers had to resort to blocking the road to press for the payment of five months of pending salaries.
Bablu Paswan was at the ISBT metro station on Wednesday morning with three fellow Civil Defence volunteers (CDVs) after a miscommunication on a WhatsApp group about a protest. Paswan lives in a slum colony in central Delhi with his parents, wife and a daughter born last month. “I owe over Rs 50,000 after borrowing money for my baby’s delivery last month,” he revealed to TOI.
CDVs are men and women who work under the command of the district magistrates and are governed by the Civil Defence Act, 1968. There have been several amendments to the legislations, the latest in 2010 adding disaster management to the role of CDVs. The volunteers assist the local administration, assuming the role of frontline workers during disasters, as happened during the pandemic and the recent floods in Delhi.
The scheme for deploying them as bus marshals was introduced in 2015, the aim being to boost security for women in public buses. In 2019, Delhi government began deploying a bus marshal in every bus in the city. Of the total 15,000 Civil Defence volunteers, more than half are now engaged in bus duties.
Priyanka, a bus marshal, said, “I am funding my brother’s education with my earnings. But I also have to take care of the house rent. My father has a problem with his legs and is unable to go to his shop.” She is apprehensive that she will lose her job now at a financially trying time because some government officials have argued against their appointment as bus marshals.
Hamstrung by the non-payment of their salaries for five months, CDVs have held protests at the state secretariat, the residence of the lieutenant governor, Delhi Transport Corporation headquarters and revenue minister Kailash Gahlot’s residence. In response, Gahlot had claimed, “We cleared the files and have ordered the payment of their salary dues. But the bureaucrats have objected that the CDVs role is for disaster management, not bus marshal.”
Gahlot said the government wants the salary outstandings paid but the officials argue that buses had CCTV now and didn’t need marshals. “A CCTV cannot be a substitute for human presence,” the minister retorted. “Human presence can stop a crime while CCTV can only provide evidence for later needs.”
Sources said that the officials contend that posting CDVs on buses as marshals contravenes the provisions of the Civil Defence Act. They say that CDVs are neither trained for this kind of security jobs nor are empowered by law to act in the event of a crime. The bureaucrats also continue to hold the view that with panic buttons installed on buses and public transport, the need for marshals has to be re-examined.
Ministers maintain that bus marshals are necessary for the safety and well-being of women in DTC buses. CDVs themselves have also been accused of being AAP volunteers. To this, Shivam Kumar asserted, “We are only doing a job entrusted to us. Employment by a government doesn’t make us ruling party supporters. People get jobs from some government or the other.”
Bablu Paswan was at the ISBT metro station on Wednesday morning with three fellow Civil Defence volunteers (CDVs) after a miscommunication on a WhatsApp group about a protest. Paswan lives in a slum colony in central Delhi with his parents, wife and a daughter born last month. “I owe over Rs 50,000 after borrowing money for my baby’s delivery last month,” he revealed to TOI.
CDVs are men and women who work under the command of the district magistrates and are governed by the Civil Defence Act, 1968. There have been several amendments to the legislations, the latest in 2010 adding disaster management to the role of CDVs. The volunteers assist the local administration, assuming the role of frontline workers during disasters, as happened during the pandemic and the recent floods in Delhi.
The scheme for deploying them as bus marshals was introduced in 2015, the aim being to boost security for women in public buses. In 2019, Delhi government began deploying a bus marshal in every bus in the city. Of the total 15,000 Civil Defence volunteers, more than half are now engaged in bus duties.
Priyanka, a bus marshal, said, “I am funding my brother’s education with my earnings. But I also have to take care of the house rent. My father has a problem with his legs and is unable to go to his shop.” She is apprehensive that she will lose her job now at a financially trying time because some government officials have argued against their appointment as bus marshals.
Hamstrung by the non-payment of their salaries for five months, CDVs have held protests at the state secretariat, the residence of the lieutenant governor, Delhi Transport Corporation headquarters and revenue minister Kailash Gahlot’s residence. In response, Gahlot had claimed, “We cleared the files and have ordered the payment of their salary dues. But the bureaucrats have objected that the CDVs role is for disaster management, not bus marshal.”
Gahlot said the government wants the salary outstandings paid but the officials argue that buses had CCTV now and didn’t need marshals. “A CCTV cannot be a substitute for human presence,” the minister retorted. “Human presence can stop a crime while CCTV can only provide evidence for later needs.”
Sources said that the officials contend that posting CDVs on buses as marshals contravenes the provisions of the Civil Defence Act. They say that CDVs are neither trained for this kind of security jobs nor are empowered by law to act in the event of a crime. The bureaucrats also continue to hold the view that with panic buttons installed on buses and public transport, the need for marshals has to be re-examined.
Ministers maintain that bus marshals are necessary for the safety and well-being of women in DTC buses. CDVs themselves have also been accused of being AAP volunteers. To this, Shivam Kumar asserted, “We are only doing a job entrusted to us. Employment by a government doesn’t make us ruling party supporters. People get jobs from some government or the other.”
