Mosquito control staff plan agitation against handover

. PHOTO: STAR

The government decision to put Dhaka Mosquito Control Department (DMCD) under the administrative authority of the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) has sparked protest among the DMCD employees.

As a wing of the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development (LGRD) and Cooperatives, the DMCD has been working with the DCC since 1982 to control mosquito menace in the city.

At present the LGRD ministry is responsible for the administration of the department but the government recently decided in principle to hand over the administrative power to the city corporation.

The employees of DMCD have strongly opposed the government's decision of empowering DCC to run the department and threatened to go for a movement against it.

"We are ready to go to the court this time against the move," said a union leader of the department terming the government move "a decision contradictory to the government's employment rules."

The government took the same initiative in 1997 but failed to implement it in the face of agitation of the employees of the department.

DCC sources said the dual governance of DMCD has made the department inactive for long and that is why the DCC had asked the government to hand over the department's administration to the corporation.

"In the last 14 years, 135 positions in this department fell vacant and the LGRD ministry did not recruit necessary manpower against the posts," said Dr Azizul Haque, chief health officer of the city corporation.

"We work along with the DMCD. If the department comes under DCC it would perform its tasks more effectively," he added.

The government took the fresh initiative to hand over the department to DCC after the corporation on April 27 this year officially applied to the government to take the department's controlling authority.

The LGRD ministry this time seems dedicated to shift the department, now run by some 400 employees. The department's office is located in city's Lalbagh area.

"The government thinks the transfer is necessary to make DMCD more active as the department has no utility under the LGRD ministry," said Serajul Haider, a senior assistant secretary of the ministry.

Nurul Islam, assistant director of DMCD, said "The government can shift any of its department to other department but a regulation should be made before putting a government department under an autonomous organisation."

The employees of DMCD feared it might be disadvantageous for them as the salary scale and other benefits in the government organisations differ from that of the autonomous bodies like DCC.

"Many of the employees like me are working here for long, and we would not get deserved pension as the pension regulations of the government and autonomous organisations are different," said an official of DMCD.

But the ministry officials said they are not going to take any decision that would hurt the employees' interest. "We will set up proper rules and regulations before doing so," the LGRD assistant secretary assured.