The deadlock at Kolkata Port Trust’s Haldia Dock Complex over operations of ABG Haldia Bulk Terminals (HBT) took an ugly turn today as a mob allegedly abducted three officials of the company and later released them.
According to an HBT statement, three officials — Manpreet Jolly, Jagadish Behara and Bushan Patil, including his wife and 1-year-old daughter — were abducted at 1 am today by about 50 unidentified persons. The company said they were released later after being “threatened at gun point” that they should not set foot again in Haldia.
“While the criminals were trying to enter into their apartments, HBT’s managers made many calls to the police begging for protection. The required help never came even after two hours. An FIR has been filed on the incident,” said Gurpreet Malhi, CEO of HBT.
The incident has an uncanny similarity to the Singur issues, where Tata Motors officials were attacked, forcing the firm to pull out of West Bengal. Malhi said that if the law and order situation deteriorates in the same fashion, the company will also be forced to pull out of Haldia.
On October 19, the Calcutta High Court had directed the state of West Bengal to provide HBT a safe environment to operate. HBT had even paid Rs 17,45,730 towards the deployment of police personnel. “The incident shows that the Haldia Police is not ready to guarantee safety to HBT,” Malhi added. Responding to reports that it was the Trinamool Congress-backed INTTUC (Indian National Trinamool Trade Union Congress) which was involved in the incident, Suvendu Adhikari, Trinamool MP from Tamluk said: “The reports are baseless and this is a blackmailing strategy by the company to move out of Haldia.”
The incident happened a day after the Kolkata Port Trust moved the high court seeking permission to terminate its agreement with HBT, which has stopped operations at the second and eighth berths of the dock complex, following unrest over the retrenchment of 275 employees at HBT.
A joint venture company between ABG Infralogistics and French firm Louis Dreyfus Armateurs, HBT had a total workforce of 1,000, of which 650 were on its payrolls, while 350 were under a sub-contractor.
The company had, however, stopped operations on September 24, citing political unrest.
