The UT Powermen Union staged a protest against privatisation of the UT electricity department in Sector 43 on Thursday. The union will also go on strike on February 1, 7, 23 and 24.

The union’s leaders appealed to all electricity department employees to make the strike on February 1 a success and said that after privatisation, the employees as well as the general public of Chandigarh will have to pay the expensive bills as fixed by the government. “The electricity rate of the company is more than twice the rate of Chandigarh. Therefore, all political parties, trade unions and mohalla committees should strongly oppose the privatisation,” said Gopal Dutt Joshi, general secretary of the union.