People's
Democracy
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of
India (Marxist) No. 50
December 22,2002
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of
India (Marxist) |
Vol.
XXVI No. 50 December 22,2002 |
Countrywide
Resistance
Against
Privatisation
of
Oil
Majors
Ø
MPs
Convey
Protest
To
PM
A
NATIONAL
joint
convention
of
trade
unions,
held
at
New
Delhi
on
December
16,
unanimously
resolved
to
go
in
for
an
all-out
countrywide
resistance
against
the
anti-national
decision
of
the
Vajpayee
government
to
hand
over
the
highly
profit-making
oil
companies
-
HPCL
and
BPCL
to
private
hands.
As
a
first
step,
from
the
convention
itself
leading
parliamentarians
belonging
to
the
left
parties
and
other
opposition
parties
went
directly
to
the
prime
minister
and
conveyed
to
him
their
protest.
Somnath
Chatterjee,
Rupchand
Pal,
Jibon
Roy,
Nilotpal
Basu,
Dipankar
Mukherjee
(all
CPI-M,
J
Chittaranjan,
CPI,
Manoj
Bhattacharya
(RSP),
Mulchand
Meena
(Congress),
Ramdeo
Bhandari,
Saroj
Dubey
(RJD)
and
others
met
the
prime
minister
in
Parliament
House
and
submitted
a
memorandum
opposing
the
privatisation
of
HPCL
and
BPCL
companies.
The
prime
minister
received
the
memorandum
and
heard
the
views
of
the
delegation
but
remained
non-committal.
The
convention
against
the
central
government’s
move
to
privatise
HPCL,
BPCL
and
the
subsidiaries
was
attended
by
representatives
of
the
trade
unions
of
different
affiliations
from
all
over
the
country
functioning
in
the
Refineries
and
Marketing
set-up
of
Bharat
Petroleum
Corporation
Ltd
(BPCL),
Hindustan
Petroleum
Corporation
Ltd
(HPCL),
Kochi
Refineries
Ltd
(KRL)
and
Numaligarh
Refineries
Ltd
(NRL).
Dipankar
Mukherjee,
Jibon
Roy,
Manoj
Bhattacharya,
MPs
and
Sebastian
Paul,
ex-MP
also
addressed
the
convention.
In
totality,
oil
sector
unions
affiliated
to
various
trade
unions
viz,
CITU,
AITUC,
INTUC,
HMS,
Shiv-Sena
Kamgar
Aghadhi,
and
various
other
independent
unions
joined
the
convention.
The
convention
resolved
to
intensify
the
campaign
and
agitation
against
the
privatisation
policies
of
the
Vajpayee
government.
The
convention
was
conducted
by
a
presidium
consisting
of
S
Devroye,
secretary
CITU,
Y
D
Sharma,
vice
president,
AITUC
and
S
V
Mhadik
of
BPC/HPC
Karmachari
Union,
Mumbai
(Shiv
Sena).
A
total
of
112
leaders
representing
20
oil
sector
unions
from
all
over
the
country
participated
in
this
convention.
Twenty
members
took
part
in
the
discussion
on
the
future
course
of
action
and
it
was
unanimously
resolved
to
go
in
for
an
all-out
countrywide
resistance
programme.
It
was
also
decided
to
intensify
the
ongoing
agitation
against
the
efforts
of
the
Vajpayee
government
to
privatise
BPCL
and
HPCL
and
go
for
a
lightning
strike
on
the
day
tenders
are
invited
by
the
government
towards
privatisation
of
these
oil
companies.
It
was
also
noted
that
in
a
related
development,
the
Officer’s
Association
of
HPCL
has
already
served
strike
notice
to
the
government.
