Survival Nagaland (SN) movement has asked the chief executive officer (CEO) of the Dimapur Municipal Council (DMC) to publish the labour wages of skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled labourers in order to maintain uniform rate throughout the district.
In a press release, SN claimed that many labourers were charging rates “at their whims and fancies” since there was hardly any presence of rate control committee of essential commodities and rate of daily wage labourers, which has not been made public for a very long time.
SN expressed appreciation to the Kohima Municipal Council (KMC) for making those rates public from time to time.
According to SN, plumbers, painters and electricians charged their own rates causing a lot of inconvenience and hardship to the common public.
Further, it stated that masons, carpenters and helpers should be categorised in proper price groupings and their rates fixed according to their grades.
SN maintained that local Naga youths, who were now starting to venture in those avenues, were forced to leave it soon as “illegal immigrants mostly the Bangladeshis make a ploy of charging much lower rates than the local youths.” It stated that after making them (Naga youths) abandon their newly found professions, they (illegal immigrants) begin making their own exorbitant rates.
This, the Survival Nagaland said was very discouraging and demoralizing the young Nagas.
Due to the absence of proper price uniformity, SN said rates were put up and put down by those migrant workers on their own.
In the light of the above, the SN has appealed to the DMC CEO “to look into the matter to save our hardworking youths from abandoning their modest professions and make them earn their bread by their own honest sweat.”