Hundreds of Anganwadi workers have come together in an agitation outside the Vikas Sadan near the Mini Secretariat office in Gurugram, demanding the payment of long due financial incentives promised by the Haryana government.
On December 29, 2021, Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar, in a meeting with the office-bearers of the Anganwadi workers’ union, announced that the monthly honorarium would be increased and the arrears for two years (2019-20 and 2020-21), along with an incentive of Rs 1,000 each, will be given to all Anganwadi workers for working as frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, protesting workers, who have been on strike since December 8, 2021, say that the promises are not enough to drive them back to work. Their fight also finds its impetus in the lack of implementation of the increment in their honorarium, which was announced in September 2018 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This would lead to an increase in the monthly honorarium by Rs 1,500 for Anganwadi workers and Rs 700 for Anganwadi helpers. The protesters are also demanding DA (dearness allowance) on a regular basis on the pattern of government employees. In 2018, Anganwadi workers had held a protest, demanding regularisation of their services. It was only after this agitation that BJP leaders had announced the incentives, which have not yet been implemented – further stirring protests in the region.
