Forest Minister of the Government of Assam, Jayanta Malla Baruah, has assured early resolution of the problems being faced by the casual and master roll workers appointed in the Forest Department of the Assam Government before April 1, 1993, who are still deprived of receiving fixed scale salary, including their salary.
The assurance was given by Minister Jayanta Malla Baruah while receiving a memorandum from a delegation of casual forest workers, who have been deprived of fixed scale salary for years, during a meeting at his official residence in Dispur on August 23.
Minister Jayanta Malla Baruah told the delegation, “I have come to the department anew. Shortly after coming to the department, I came to know about your problems. Give me some time and after that I will solve the remaining problems including getting salary at the fixed rate.”
Meanwhile, during the meeting held in a cordial atmosphere, the delegation felicitated the minister with a traditional ‘phulam gamosa’ and also discussed issues related to tree plantation, wildlife protection and other ground-level problems prevailing in the Forest Department.
The delegation comprised about 15 deprived casual forest workers including Jyotish Doloi, Pramod Rongpi, Shobhamani Das, Monika Das, Shahjahan Ali, Minhajuddin Ahmed, Uday Rabha and Montu Das.
It is to be mentioned that in the memorandum submitted to the minister, the delegation stated that the wage-deprived workers working in various branches under the department have been serving the Forest Department and the Government of Assam without pay and in exchange for very low wages in the hope of getting a permanent job.
Moreover, as per the direction of the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, a high-level committee was formed under the leadership of Dr. Satyendra Nath Singh and sought the list of workers from various forest division authorities of Assam. This list was sent in September 2025 from the office of the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests to the Special Chief Secretary of the Forest Department. In that list, due to negligence of some officers of the Forest Department, the names of some casual forest workers were left out from the verification. We have also demanded inclusion of the names that were left out. At present, as the list is lying in the Finance Department, the wage-deprived workers have again become disappointed.