BTech engineers stage protest

PESHAWAR: The Bachelor of Technology (BTech) engineers on Thursday staged protest outside the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly in favour of their demands.

However, the police stopped them from staging protest outside the Peshawar High Court due to the visit of the Chief Justice of Pakistan.

The BTech engineers also marched on to the Peshawar Press Club and held a rally against the government for failing to provide service structure to 700 BTech engineers in various departments across the province.

They warned of halting work on various projects if the government failed to address their reservations.

Speaking on the occasion, Syed Zahid Kazmi, provincial president of the BTech engineers association, said that the Supreme Court and Peshawar High Court had given verdict in their favour but the government was not implementing the court decision.

The government should admit their demands and fix 50 percent quota for the Engineering Technologist for promotion to grade 17 and 18, he said. He also demanded that these engineers should be allowed to apply for grade 18 jobs.

They said that such policies were being implemented in Punjab but the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government was reluctant to give them their due right.

It may be mentioned that the engineers have been launched the pen-down strike for acceptance of their demands for the last four days.

They have set up a protest camp at the Communication and Works (C&W) Department to press the government for acceptance of their demands.

Convener, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Association of Government Engineers, Shakir Habib said that they presented four demands including up-gradation, professional allowance, abolition of the quota in grade-17 engineering jobs for Bachelor of Technology (B-Tech) and diploma holders and allowing the public sector engineers limited private practice.

He said the quota allocated for diploma holders was unjust and a move towards denying rights to Bachelor of Engineering degree holders.

About the private practice, he said, the salaries of the engineers were too low and their families cannot manage their domestic budget in their present income.