DADU, Dec 3: More than 300 temporary employees hired for the Right Bank Outfall Drain project complained on Wednesday that they had not been paid salaries for last six months.

The affected employees led by Ali Gohar Lakho, Roshan Ali and Mohammad Anees held a demonstration against non-payment of salary and said they would not be able to celebrate Eid this year because they had nothing to buy their families anything.

They said their families were starving and their children had stopped going to school because they could not pay the fee.

Ali Gohar said that they had been told that they had been not been paid the salary because the provincial department had not released the budget.

Mohammad Azam said that the machinery had been shifted from the project sites owing to non-release of funds.

The funds’ release was delayed after secretary finance went to Saudi Arabia for Hajj, he said.

He appealed to President Asif Ali Zardari to take notice and direct additional secretary of finance to release funds to the RBOD project.

RBOD Executive Engineer Nasrullah Soomro said that salaries would be paid to the temporary employees when budget was released to the department.