Darjeeling, Jan. 7: Causal workers employed by the DGHC have started demanding permanent status, after having worked with the council for more than two decades.

A section of the workers has formed the Council Casual Workers’ Organisation to push for this demand.

The organisation has been formed under the aegis of the GNLF, which seems to have made a U-turn on backing the DGHC policy of hiring only causal workers.

“It enjoys the backing of the GNLF, but is not affiliated to the party. The body will work independently and we will try and help it attain its goals, job security being one of them,” said A.R. Dewan, secretary, GNLF Darjeeling Branch Committee.

Ratan Tamang has been made the president of the new organisation.

Although the DGHC had been empowered to fill up Group C and Group D posts at the council with permanent employees, Subash Ghisingh the administrator, has so far appointed only casual workers.

In fact, while council employees including most of the executive officers were initially on a one-year contract, the Gorkha leader had decided a couple of years ago to change the job agreement to six-months. Thus, around 5,000 DGHC employees have to get their contracts renewed twice a year. Apart from the change in contract, Ghisingh had also slashed the salaries of most of the causal employees at that time.

Political observes believe that Ghisingh’s policy of shortening contract tenures was meant to keep a hold on the party as well as the council workers.

But recently, a change in the political scenario in the hills and the rising dissent among the workers seem to have forced the GNLF to rethink its policy. This was especially after Bimal Gurung, the president of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, threatened to take to the streets even if one of his supporters was thrown out of a council job.

The birth of the Morcha, currently riding high on popular support, has come as a challenge to the GNLF, especially as the party has been forming units in almost all sectors in the hills.