Protests ignored, SAIL begins winding up Kolkata raw material division – Times of India

KOLKATA: The Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) is going ahead with its decision to dismantle the raw material division (RMD) in Kolkata despite protests from the Mamata Banerjee government. It is transferring the 100-odd employees of the division to Bokaro, Rourkela, Bhilai and other places. A writ petition filed by the employees’ union in this regard was struck down by a single bench of Calcutta High Court on Friday.
“We are being instructed to shift from Kolkata with immediate effect to the place where we’ve been transferred,” an employee of the division said.
The division was set up in 1989 to bring captive mines under a single umbrella to ensure seamless supply of raw materials from the mines to the plants.
The Maharatna PSU initiated a restructuring last month that brought iron ore and flux mines in Odisha under Rourkela Steel Plant, the mines in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh under Bhilai Steel Plant and those in Jharkhand under the Bokaro Steel Plant. The coal mines in Bengal were put under the administrative control of Bokaro Steel.
The PSU has three plants in Bengal — Durgapur Steel Plant, Alloy Steel Plant and IISCO.
The SAIL order on restructuring issued in June said: “All coal mines of SAIL in Jharkhand along with the coal mine in Bengal at Ramnagore and coal washeries will be under Bokaro Steel Plant (BSL). Director in-charge of BSL will be designated owner of these mines.”
State finance minister Amit Mitra wrote to Union steel minister Dharmendra Pradhan to reverse the decision to dismantle the raw material division in Kolkata. He alleged in the letter that ever since the NDA government had come to office in Delhi, there was an ominous pattern of shifting headquarters of PSUs from Kolkata. Pradhan refuted the charges, but Mitra expressed surprise over him not clearing the air about the raw material division.
State INTTUC general secretary Ritabrata Banerjee had also strongly protested the move.