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Dunlop may reopen Bengal unit in March

Mohammd Javed R in Calcutta

The Dunlop authorities and the workers' unions affiliated to the Centre for Indian Trade Unions and Indian National Trade Union Congress have failed to evolve a consensus on the reopening of the Sahagunj unit in West Bengal.

The company management apparently refused to meet with the waiting mediamen at its Calcutta head office, and is reported to have promised to rehabilitate the Sahagunj unit before March 11.

Interestingly, the Dunlop bigwigs led by its vice president, PK Sharma, had agreed to hold talks with the defiant CITU only after the West Bengal chief minister, Jyoti Basu, intervened to bring an end to the deadlock.

But, with Sharma non-commital on a deadline for the reopening the Sahaganj unit, it seems even Basu's charisma has apparently failed to yield desirable results.

Sharma, after a closed door meeting with Basu yesterday, had appeared optimistic about the possibilities of the rehabilitition of Dunlop's only factory in West Bengal. Talking to reporters, he, however, had blamed the CITU for not signing the minutes of the meeting on January 6, 1999. The CITU's reluctance in signing the said minutes, he observed, was the only impediment to the reopening of Sahagunj unit.

The January 6 minute had not included the CITU's demand, which said that, "unless the management agrees to clear the arrears wages of Dunlop employees, it will not allow the company to reoperate from West Bengal."

INTUC, however, had no apprehensions in signing the minutes even without the inclusion of the CITU's demands. With the CITU maintaining a defiant approach all along, the Sahagunj unit could not be rehabilitated on its scheduled date, February 7, 2000.

The failure to restart the Sahagunj unit, thus, led to a verbal warfare between the management and CITU, both holding each other responsible for compounding the plight of 4,000 jobless workers of Dunlop.

What, however, remains a mystery is the management not announcing a date for the opening of Sahagunj unit even when CITU today finally signed the minutes.

The only significance of today's meeting was that the company higher-ups agreed to accomodate CITU's demand for clearing the arrears of all employees with the functioning of Sahagunj unit.

CITU general secretary Dipankar Roy warned the management to stand by its promise; else, the union would be forced to intensify its agitation further.

UNI adds: Dunlop India Limited vice-president Prem Sharma on Thursday met West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu to discuss ways for re-opening the company's Sahaganj unit.

"We expect to arrive at a positive result regarding re-opening of Sahaganj unit within next two days,'' Sharma said.

Basu had yesterday summoned Dunlop president M D Shukla to get first hand information about the management's view about not re-opening the Sahaganj unit. But, since Shukla was scheduled to meet Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi during the day, he had informed Basu that Sharma will attend the meeting.

Basu had reportedly asked Sharma to modify the contents of the minutes during the meeting on which CITU had refused to put on signatures, which had ultimately led to refusal by the management to re-open the factory on February 7.

Sharma said the letter has to be changed as per the chief minister's instructions, but essence will remain the same.

Asked when the production at Sahaganj would begin, Sharma said, ''We will not jump the gun immediately. We are going to have some discussions tomorrow with both INTUC and CITU and after that, a final decision would be taken.''

He, however, categorically said there was no change in minutes of the meeting held on January 6, which was sent to all the unions for signature.

Basu had said that the management of Dunlop had falsified the minutes and for that CITU had refused to sign. ''Dunlop management should be prosecuted for this,'' Basu had said.

Sharma said, ''We will have to rehash the production and re-opening plan afresh following the meeting with the chief minister.''

The company had lost government orders and failed to bid for fresh tenders due to failure to re-start production at Sahaganj unit, he said.

The production in the unit and also at Ambattur in Tamil Nadu was scheduled to begin on February 7, after a gap of two years, following a bi-partite meeting. But that was not to be. One of the powerful unions, CITU, refused to sign minutes of the meeting.

However, Ambattur factory had started production from February 9 after suspension of work was lifted on February 7.

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