The buses in Haryana stayed off the road for a day on 31 March 2010 as 18,000 members of Haryana Roadways Workers (affiliated to All India Road Workers` Federation, CITU) and Haryana Transport Karmachari Union went on a 24-hour strike. The Haryana roadways employees were protesting against the government`s action of issuing 3,700 permits to private operators to run bus services in the state. The employees were also demanding regularisation of 3,000 employees. The Haryana Roadways Employees Union leader, Sarbat Singh Punia, told the media, “Our decision to strike was forced on us by the government because it is not ready to listen to our genuine and just demands. If the government still does not listen to our woes and lamentations, we will be forced to take the more severe recourse of a longer or an indefinite strike.” Though the state government officials claimed that the strike was a failure and that over half of the buses plied on the roads, the union leaders claimed the strike to be very successful. The union leaders also claimed that the state administration tried to break the strike by using terror tactics and even arrested a number of union members. The government, on the other hand, claimed that it was looking sympathetically into the genuine grievances of the transport workers. It explained that it is issuing licences to private players, with a view to improve the existing transport system, which would improve transport facilities in rural and less connected areas, without harming the Haryana Roadways revenues. The government also said it welcomes any suggestions on its new transport policy, while it claimed that a committee is sympathetically looking into the regularisation demands of the unions. The union leaders lamented that this “looking into demands” has been going on since 2003.