Rama.Udayakumar, secretary, Anna Workers & Staff Union, which belongs to the ruling AIADMK government in Tamil Nadu, said that the matter will be taken up to the chief minister immediately, and on sunday all trade unions will meet to take a final decision on when the strike notice will be served.
“We are planning to go an indefinite strike,” said Udayakumar.
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Representatives from other major unions including Communist Party of India, the Labour Progressive Federation and other political parties Unions at NLC have also confirmed the decision.
It may be noted recently Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa wrote to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, opposing disinvestment in the integrated mining-cum-power generating company. She had said divestment in the company would lead to labour unrest and disruption of power supply from Neyveli.
DMK Supermo M Karunanidhi in May cautioned the Centre against dilution of its stake in NLC and warned that any such move would only earn the Manmohan government further opposition in Tamil Nadu.
Udayakumar said “today the stake sale is 5%, if we leave it step by step it will go upto 43%, we will loose our allowance, rights, jobs and everything. We dont want this to happen”.
It may be noted two previous attempts to divest NLC shares to private investors, in 2002 and 2006, had to be aborted due to the pressure from trade unions and from the State Government.
S Rajavannian, general secretary of NLC Labour Progressive Federation, affiliated to DMK, said that the company has so far given out Rs 2,000 crore as dividend. For instance, in 2011-12 alone the dividend was Rs 470 crore and in 2012-13, it is expected to be around Rs 500 crore.
“The company has been profitable from 1977 and compared to the dividend it gives yearly, the sales of 5 per cent would only fetch around Rs 466 crore,” he said. The federation would be holding strong protest against the issue and also would look at agitations if the government goes on with its decision, he said.
In earlier communication to NLC and the government, the trade unions pointed out that their opposition to divestment was also based on fears that, as a government company, NLC was able to provide affordable power to consumers leveraging advantages of coal blocks allocated by the government and this would change since private investments would force the company to focus on profit.
But the government conveyed to the trade unions that the basic ownership structure, which saw the government as single largest shareholder, with a 93.5% stake, would change only marginally following the 5% equity offloading to private investors.
The trade unions, representing around 17,500 workers in NLC would force a shut-down of operations to prevent the inclusion of private investors in the ownership of the company, as it would lead to job losses and erosion of worker rights in the company, a trade union leader said.
In an event of any such shut down the worst impact will be on the State of Tamil Nadu, since NLC is one of the major sources for the electricity. Already the State is facing power shortage to the tune of 4000 MW, resulting in long power cuts across the state, while in the City it ranges from 2-4 hours.