ASHAs' strike completes 100 days
Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) who have been on an indefinite strike in front of the Secretariat for the past 100 days marked the occasion by holding aloft flambeaus to underline the strength of their agitation.
Poet Rosemary inaugurated the protest by lighting a torch. Representatives of the ASHAs expressed their resolve to continue the strike till their demands were met.
The ASHAs, under the umbrella of the Kerala ASHA Health Workers' Association (KAHWA), have been agitating since February demanding an increase in their honorarium and retirement benefits. During this period, their protest has assumed several forms from Assembly march and offering Pongala to tonsuring heads and staging hunger agitation. The ASHAs are now two weeks into a day-night protest march from Kasaragod.
At the Secretariat, a 100-day protest meeting was presided over by KAHWA vice-president S. Mini.
Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president Sunny Joseph addressed the striking ASHAs. Leaders of the ASHAs also spoke.
Shafi Parambil, MP; P.C. Vishnunath and Mathew Kuzhalnadan, MLAs; District Congress Committee president Palode Ravi; former Health Minister V.S. Sivakumar; and other Congress leaders M. Liju, T. Sarathchandra Prasad, and Kaimanam Prabhakaran; and Mahila Congress leader Lakshmi spoke.
Meanwhile, the day-night protest march that reached Palakkad on Monday will continue there on Wednesday before entering Thrissur.
The government had recently constituted a five-member committee to study the demands of the ASHAs and submit a report within three months.
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