People's Democracy

THE workers and common people in the stone mining area near Tosham town of Bhiwani district (Haryana) are waging a heroic struggle, braving brutal police repression. In the entire area covering 35 villages, the work at stone quarries has come to a halt. Not only the workers but the entire villages have joined this struggle against the administration-contractor nexus under the patronage of Om Prakash Chautala government.

Several hundred people, including women and children, have suffered injuries due to police beatings. Hundreds have been arrested. The entire stone mining area has been converted into a police camp. Many battalions of police force have been brought from other districts. Police force has been deployed in every village in the area and has been carrying on witch-hunts in every village, manhandling women and children with uncivilised brutality. Section 144 has been invoked in the area to prevent meetings. House to house search operations are being carried out to arrest the leaders of the struggle.

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) took the lead in mobilising the rural folk against the illegal extortion and repression by the contractors’ henchmen with active patronage of the police and district administration. It soon became a people’s movement against the tyranny of the state government-contractor combine.

The focal point of the struggle is Khanak village having 10 stone mining plots. Three of them were with the workers’ union, under lease. The other seven plots were recently leased out to a combine of contractors, known to be the chief minister’s close associates. The contractors deployed gangster groups to instal illegal barriers/check posts at all the exit points in the village and even on the public road, and began to extort huge sums on the finished stone materials coming out of the village, in the name of royalty. Their royalty (extortion) rates are abnormally high --- Rs 2.50 per cubic foot or Rs 250 per small trolley, Rs 500 per small canter, Rs 1,000 per truck and Rs 2,500 per bigger trolley.

These contractors did not invest anything for the production work. Jobs like exploding/bursting a mine, manually breaking the stones, crushing them to bring them to required sizes, and their loading and unloading in trucks/trolleys --- all are being done by the village for decades.

Earlier, prior to the contractors’ regime, the workers, crushing men, trolley owners and operators, etc, themselves used to collectively pay the lease money and taxes to the government. A few years back, during the time of the Bansilal government, a move was made to lease out these mines to contractors, but the government had had to cancel the contract in face of stiff resistance from the workers and villagers. It was during that struggle that the Khanak Stone Mine Workers Union was formed with the CITU’s effort.

But, ignoring the villagers’ rights, the Chautala government leased out seven mining plots at Khanak village a few months back. And then started the Operation Extortion by the contractors. This has increased the prices of finished stones manifold in the market and has put the entire economy of stone production in jeopardy. The workers were the hardest hit. The rate of extortion is so high that daily collection goes up to more than a couple of lakhs of rupees from the mining cluster in Khanak area itself.

Not only that, with the blessings of the chief minister’s office and the active patronage extended by the administration, these contractors were so emboldened that they imposed a ‘royalty’ on the output from even those mines which are with the workers’ union. With police support, they have taken forcible possession of even the office and other belongings of the union. Perhaps the contractors thought that the villagers and workers would meekly surrender to the muscle-power at their command.

With the CITU standing by them, the workers and villagers conveyed their strong opposition to these illegal acts and intimidating activities in villages. On January 29 last, the workers and villagers staged a 10,000-strong demonstration and submitted a memorandum to the district administration. They demanded intervention against the contractors’ unlawful activities, removal of illegal barriers by February 2, registration of all those working in these mines, and fixation of their minimum wages and other social security benefits. They were addressed by Haryana state CITU general secretary Satvir Singh, its vice president Pravat Singh, and the CPI(M) state secretary Indrajit Singh, apart from leaders of other opposition parties including the Congress. But the administration took no action on the memorandum. On February 2, reiterating their demands, a big gathering of more than 10,000 workers and common people held another demonstration and surrounded the illegal check posts/barriers installed by the contractors.

Since February 2 night, the police onslaught against the villagers started. A large reinforcement of police force ransacked and looted their houses. People were indiscriminately beaten. Women and children were dragged out and severely tortured. Mass scale arrest of villagers including women and children (mostly below 13 years) was made. To date, only 36 of those arrested have been produced in the court. The police are still entering houses in the name of a search, vulgarly abuse the women, manhandle the children, and threaten the villagers with dire consequences if they dare oppose the contractors.

Prohibitory orders have been invoked against all types of gathering, even social assemblies. However, ignoring these orders, villagers assembled in thousands in front of the Gungipa Mandir in the Khanak mining area on February 3, to protest against police repression. The meeting was addressed by Satvir Singh (CITU), Indrajit Singh (CPI-M) and Brinda Karat (All India Democratic Women’s Association), among others.

On February 7, a panchayat meeting was called in Saral village outside the area where section 144 is in force. Massive police force diverted all the public buses en route to that village and installed a police check post, manned by the DSP and the SDM themselves, to stop the people from joining that meeting. CITU all-India secretary Tapan Sen, Indrajit Singh, S N Solanki (president, Haryana state CITU), Jagmati Sangwan (president, Haryana state JMS), Hiranand Arya (ex-minister and Congress leader), and Brahmanand (advocate and local Youth Congress leader) were all taken into custody on their way to the meeting.

However, still the police could not stop the meeting. The villagers of the adjoining area and also the main leadership of the struggle reached the meeting place through unconventional routes, crossing the fields, and resolved to carry on the struggle till the demands are realised.

Despite so much terror and the district administration’s madness, the workers could not be made to surrender. To date, operation has not started in the stone mining area. The combing operations by the police have failed to trap the leaders who are leading the struggle from the midst of the workers. Under the CITU leadership, workers are determined to cry halt to the contractor-government combine’s illegal extortion regime and the reign of terror unleashed by the administration that is out to demonstrate its slavish loyalty to the contractors’ combine.

On February 9, workers staged a big demonstration before Haryana Bhawan in Delhi, the national capital, in solidarity with the stone quarry workers. They were addressed by Tapan Sen, S B Bharadwaj (president, Delhi state CITU), S N Solanki and Chowrasia (president, Khan Mazdoor Workers Union, Faridabad), among others. On February 12, workers and other mass organisations of women, student, youth and peasants staged militant solidarity demonstrations at all the district headquarters and industrial centers throughout Haryana. More solidarity actions are being planned.