A senior official in the Uttar Pradesh public works department has begun the process of deducting a day’s salary from PWD employees as “voluntary” contribution towards building a Ram temple in Ayodhya, angering staff who said their permission had not been taken.
Rajpal Singh, engineer-in-chief of the development section of the PWD, has purportedly written to a bank at Hazrathganj in Lucknow seeking to open an account in the name of “PWD Ram Mandir Welfare”. The letter, dated January 9, 2021, mentions that a day’s pay would be deducted from the salaries of PWD employees and the amount would be deposited in this account.