After sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh, it’s now the turn of jute mills in West Bengal to reel under shortage of labour. This has forced many jute mills to reduce their production hours and go for production cuts.
The 52 working jute mills in West Bengal employ around 400,000 workers and the labour shortfall is about 30 per cent.
“The workers are more interested in getting engaged in different government schemes like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and other alternative sources of income like employment in real estate and security services. Workers do not even bother losing jobs if a mill closes down. Some mills in Hooghly are closed for the past four months and the workers are not bothered as they have found alternative jobs locally,” said an industry source.
Though jute mills are considered the highest daily wage payers in the textile sector, they are increasingly finding it difficult to employ a new person or retain an old hand. A newcomer gets a daily wage of Rs 227, while an experienced worker earns Rs 404.
There are also mills which are paying a daily wage of less than Rs 100 and are violating the terms of the recently signed industry-wide tripartite agreement with the West Bengal government and the Indian Jute Mills Association (IJMA). The jute industry has a statutory outstanding of around Rs 600 crore by way of gratuity, provident fund and ESI dues.
“We have failed to provide the necessary infrastructure and ambience in mills to workers. Today, no worker would be interested to work in jute mills under polluting conditions only for a meagre additional payment of Rs 50 per day in comparison to other available source of income. Besides, mill managers have also lost all communication with workers,” said a jute mill owner.
More From This Section
“Mill owners will have to change their old attitude towards workers and stop exploiting them and behave like industrialists. They behave like mercantilists and feudal lords. Unless the babu culture is destroyed, the jute mills will not survive,” said a jute union leader.
Manish Poddar, chairman of IJMA, declined to comment.
A worker earns between Rs 130-140 daily in other industries of the textile sector like synthetics, wool, silk and cotton.
Under the MGNREGA scheme, the daily payment is also as low as Rs 150-160.
However, for other industries like real estate and security services, the payment is higher than Rs 300 per day depending on the nature of job. The jute industry is not covered under the Minimum Wages Act as it is governed by the tripartite agreement.
The jute mills in West Bengal produce 90 per cent of the country’s jute goods. The industry can produce 2.3 million tonnes jute goods.
The jute industry, with a turnover of Rs 8,000 crore, has had a very small compounded annual growth rate of around two per cent in the past 10 years.