Group of ITN staffers to seek Supreme Court intervention

Colombo, Dec.25 (Daily Mirrir) - A group of staffers of the Independence Television Network (ITN) is to seek Supreme Court intervention over the irregularities of a voluntary retirement scheme of the state institution, which is underway at present, the Daily Mirror learns.

One of the aggrieved staff members of the ITN told the Daily Mirror yesterday that several irregularities of the proposed VRS had affected certain qualified staff members who have applied for that already.

He said the proposed VRS was announced by an institutional circular (ITN/1551) issued on June 13 this year, undersigned by its General Manager and 113 staff members altogether had applied for the scheme.

Out of the applied 113 staff members, about 79 had initially been approved for the scheme, and the individual applications were authorized by their respective unit heads and divisional heads.

However, six applicants of this approved list of 79, had been slashed afterwards bringing down the approved list to 73 and already 30 of them had been granted letters of VRS by terminating their services from December 15th pending the payment of compensation, the staffer said.

The aggrieved staff members had complained to the Commissioner of Labour and the first inquiry was held before the Assistant Labour Commissioner for Colombo East on October 17th.

The staff members who were exempted from the VRS claim among the irregularities were issues of approving applicants with shorter periods of service compared to those who were with a longer service, approving staffers over the stipulated age limit of 50 years and not issuing index numbers for the received or processed applications.

Also, some of the serious irregularities are approving the VRS compensation to several staffers who had left ITN for foreign employment in the past year with no pay leave and even granting the VRS to employees who hold the only position of certain mandatory units.

The aggrieved staffers claim that although the institution’s director board should be responsible for the selection and approval process of this VRS, only three deputy general managers are performing that act.

When contacted ITN Chairman Sudarshana Gunawardena said they were carrying out the VRS programme as per the government circular in 2016 and looking at the excess staff of certain units and departments of the institution.

Gunawardena said he had already received the appeals of the aggrieved party and that they had already set up an appeal board to consider such complaints.

“We understand how certain applicants have grievances as they were not selected but the institution was based only on the recommendations of the deputy general managers when selecting the suitable applicants as per the service requirement,” he said.

“If anybody is not satisfied with the management decision they could always go for legal action, which we can respond afterwards,” the Chairman said.