Hundreds of workers of the Daily Janakantha have laid siege to the Janakantha building with the editor and owner inside in demand for 26 months of arrear salary. In solidarity, leaders of the Dhaka journalist unions have also joined them. The siege began from Saturday (Dec 22) evening. The journalists are also refraining from work. As a result, the paper was not published on Sunday (Dec 23).
A former employee of Janakantha says that a tripartite agreement was proposed by journalists and union leaders, which the owner refused to accept.
General Secretary of the journalist union, Sohel Haider Chowdhury, said, “Journalists of a first rate paper have been working without pay for a long time; we want assurance from the owner that their salaries and wages would be paid off.”
Unless this is done, the protest movement will carry on. Daily Janakantha Unit Chief Rajon Bhattacharya said, “Owners promised to pay all dues three months ago by December, but so far, we have not received anything.”
We gave a letter to the owner, stipulating Dec 24 as the final date but the owners did not respond.
However, when we went to the owners they said that arrear salaries will be paid off when there’s money, he added.
“That’s why we have taken a position here and will carry on the siege until the payments are made.”