"Work is 100 per cent normal at the Haldia docks. The CPI(M), Congress and a section of the media are tarnishing the image of the Mamata Banerjee government over the HBT issue," Adhikary, a party strongman in East Midnapore district where Haldia falls, said denying his involvement in the exit of HBT.
"The problems have been created around the private cargo handler ABG and it is sought to be given the image of an industrial house," he said referring to HBT, jointly promoted by ABG group of India and French logistics company LDA.
Describing it as a political conspiracy and slander campaign to belittle the Trinamool Congress government in the state, he said, "We have long been clamouring for reinstatement of retrenched workers and deploying them at berths 2 and 8, which had not been looked into."
Problems brewed at the Haldia dock complex run by Kolkata Port Trust (KoPT), after HBT sacked 275 employees last month on the ground that there was surplus staff. The cargo handler announced its exit on October 31.
HBT had alleged on October 28 that three of its management officials and two of their family members were forcibly taken away by outsiders who warned them not to return to Haldia.
