After rooting for industry for the last four years, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee-led West Bengal government is in a hurry to shed its bourgeois values.
Ahead of next year's assembly elections, the state government is now batting for the workers.
The labour minister recently convened a meeting with representatives of the Consultative Committee of Plantation Associations (CCPA), asking for an ad hoc wage hike for the 250,000 tea workers across 300 estates North Bengal, as the next hike is due next year.
Separate meetings between the CCPA members and labour minister and labour commissioner were held on the interim wage and discussions were still continuing.
“We have firmly informed the state government of our stand that it would not be possible to comply with the request. The state government wants an ad hoc increase in the wake of rising food prices, but as per the last tripartite agreement wages daily wages in Bengal at Rs 67 are higher than that prevailing in Assam,” said a CCPA representative.
The industry is baffled as to why the state government is trying to push through an interim hike, when discussions for it should commence in March 2011. But 2011 is a crucial year for the Left Front government in West Bengal, which faces its toughest challenge, after the drubbing in the past few elections.
“It appears that the state government is trying to strengthen Citu’s (Centre of Indian Trade Unions’) position in the tea estates which is somewhat threatened by the Akhil Bharatiya Adavasi Vikas Parishad, now a registered trade union,” said CCPA sources.
After the debacle in the Lok Sabha elections, CPI(M)-affiliated Citu has been feeling the heat at Bengal’s biggest industrial hub Haldia, as well.
| FOCUS ON PRO-POOR CORE VALUE > Labour minister asks for an ad hoc wage hike for 250,000 tea workers across 300 estates North Bengal > Decision leaving behind baffled industry as to why state government trying to push through interim hike, when discussions for it should commence in March 2011 > Appears as though state government is trying to strengthen Citu’s (Centre of Indian Trade Unions’) position in the tea estates > Citu been feeling heat at Bengal’s biggest industrial hub Haldia post Lok Sabha debacle last year |
The Tamluk Lok Sabha constituency (which includes the Assembly constituencies of Haldia and Nandigram) was wrested by the Trinamool Congress from the CPI(M) in the last general elections. As a consequence, Lakshman Seth of the Left, who ended up on the losing side, had to give up the chairmanship of the Haldia Development Authority (HDA), which facilitates planning, land acquisition, social welfare, among various other activities.
Consequently, Haldia has become the muscle flexing ground for the trade unions affiliated to the state’s two main political parties. While Citu is trying to hold to what was its fiefdom, the Indian National Trinamool Trade Union Congress (INTTUC), on the other hand, is treating Haldia as its new power centre.
Bhattacharjee may have come under flak from general secretary Prakash Karat in the party’s rectification drive, but the chief minister’s “Do it now” campaign has reversed in favour of the erstwhile strike culture.
