Yogi Adityanath invokes ESMA, bans strikes in UP for 6 months: Report

The Yogi Adityanath government has banned strikes across the states for six months. A notification was issued by additional chief secretary Dr Devesh Kumar Chaturvedi on Sunday, Hindustan Times’ sister publication Livehindustan reported.

It states that the strike is being banned in any public service, corporations and local authorities which deal with the state affairs of Uttar Pradesh, Livehindustan further reported.

Those who defy the orders will face legal action, the notification has warned.

Earlier in May, the Uttar Pradesh government had banned strikes for six months by invoking the Essential Services Maintenance Act or ESMA. The decision was taken because of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic.

The ESMA Act empowers a state government to take action against employees who are on strike or refusing to work on essential services which are important for maintaining normal life. It gives state police power to arrest anyone without any warrant if they are found to be violating its provision.

The act has a provision of mandatory imprisonment, which may extent to one year, or a fine of ₹1,000 or both.

The Uttar Pradesh government had invoked ESMA in May last year, and the order banning strikes was extended again for six months in November, 2020.

Uttar Pradesh recorded 23 fresh cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, which pushed the number of active Covid cases under treatment to 196.

“The test positivity rate (TPR) in the past 24 hours was is 0.012% with a total of 1,88,560 samples tested (in 24 hours) and 23 of them were found Covid positive,” said Dr Abhishek Shukla, secretary general, Association of International Doctors.

According to the data from the state health department, on Saturday there were 189 active Covid cases and on Friday 164. In all, 16 patients recovered in the past 24 hours. Till now, 16,87,584 patients have recovered in the state.

Till now, Uttar Pradesh has tested 9,07,50,349 Covid samples.