ISLAMABAD, Oct 12: Parliamentary secretary for information technology and telecommunications Riffat Javed on Tuesday told the National Assembly that the ongoing strike by Pakistan Telecommunication Company (PTCL) employees for acceptance of their demands was "illegal and unjustified."

In response to a calling-attention notice by People's Party Parliamentarians (PPP) members, Ms Javed said the strike was illegal because at present no union and CBA existed in the company.

Chaudhry Manzoor Ahmed of the PPP said the government was forced to announce the regularization of 4,500 daily wages employees in the PTCL after their long protest. However, he said, instead of regularizing the services, the government had started their victimization by transferring them.

He said out of the 543 daily wage employees in Balochistan, only 32 had been regularized while the remaining were transferred to other sections to avoid regularization of their services. Similarly, there were reports that the PTCL was planning to sack some 646 daily wage employees in Karachi, he added.

Ms Javed told the house that the process of regularization was continuing and the services of all the 4,500 employees would be regularized gradually. Qamaruz Zaman Kaira challenged the secretary's claim that there was no union or CBA in the PTCL.

He said a referendum was held in the PTCL on March 16. However, when the government- backed union lost the referendum, it was challenged in the high court and the government sought a stay.

The PPP MNA said the government had got stay from the high court on the plea that the elections were conducted by the National Industrial Relations Commission which had only one member and no Supreme Court judge had been appointed there. "If only one judge is working in the NIRC, then it is the fault of the government," he said.

The parliamentary secretary said the referendum was illegal as it was conducted by the NIRC in the absence of a Supreme Court judge." She said the referendum had also been challenged by the runners-up union in the Peshawar High Court.

Fauzia Wahab said the secretary should inform the house when new members of the NIRC would be appointed. The parliamentary secretary said the appointment of NIRC members was the responsibility of the ministry of labour and manpower and the telecommunications ministry had nothing to do with it.

On this, the PPP members protested and said it was the collective responsibility of the government and the secretary should make a clear statement. Naheed Khan said if no steps were taken to resolve the employees' problems, the government could face a huge loss of revenue. Ms Javed, however, expressed the hope that the matter would soon be resolved amicably.