Mamata Banarjee’s Cruel Hoax on Coal Workers

B Prasant

ON assumption of the coal ministry of the BJP-led NDA government, one of the first things Mamata Banerjee did was to announce a five-point package on the basis of which she called upon the Left-led coal workers unions not to go in for a strike action. The package contained the following assertions, which Banerjee also made public while meeting the mediapersons at the Kolkata Press Club on January 12.

• The coal mines nationalisation (amendment) bill 2003 will not be raised before the parliament without the full consent of the workers’ unions

• Outsourcing and related issues would be re-evaluated in detail

• None of the coal mines and coal mine units like the ECL, the BCCL, and the Dankuni coal complex would be closed down; the mining institutions would have the benefits of a revival package; no worker will be laid off in any manner

• The decision by the union government to lower import duties on coal would be immediately reconsidered and the import duty sought to be re-introduced

•  On the basis of the assurance by the workers unions that they would not go in for the all-India strike action, 15 per cent of the basic pay would released as interim relief with effect from January 1, 2004

 The subsequent days and weeks have proved how Banerjee had deliberately lied to try and garner a bit of sympathy of the otherwise suspecting coal mine workers as the run up to the Lok Sabha polls approached.   This is how her assertions worked out in practice:

• With the Lok Sabha dissolved, Banerjee would have nothing to do with the bill that was to have been raised

• Outsourcing is going on at full tilt and Banerjee had the temerity to openly declare recently that the department of coal “could not do without outsourcing”

• The process of closing down mines is going relentlessly on; only, the terms ‘suspension of work’ and ‘work suspension’ are being used towards the purpose of closing down the mines

• The work of downsizing is being carried on unremittingly with the result that within the next decade, all the units of the ECL would get automatically shut down; no amounts have been sanctioned for any form of revival package for the sick and non-functioning coal mines

• The import duty on coal has not been re-introduced in the interim budget of the union government

• The ad interim relief has not been released in the manner and within the time-frame it was promised to be

 The exercise in untruth of Mamata Banerjee has been described by the Bharat Colliery Mazdoor Union (CITU) as a cruel hoax played on the coalmine workers.