Guwahati, Feb 21: The death toll of workers of two ‘defunct’ paper mills in Assam has risen to 100, with an employee of Cachar Paper Mill at Panchgram passing away on Sunday evening.
Manindra Chandra Das, 56, an employee of Cachar Paper Mill, died of a severe heart attack. According to sources at the paper mill, Das was ill for the past two years.
It may be noted that the Cachar Paper Mill at Panchgram in Hailakandi district and Nagaon Paper Mill at Jagiroad in Morigaon district have been non-functional since October 2015 and March 2017 respectively.
Alleging apathy despite repeated pleas made to the government to revive the non-operational paper mills, Manobendra Chakraborty, president of the Joint Action Committee of Recognised Unions (JACRU) of the two mills on Monday said it “is extremely unfortunate that in a welfare state such as India, 100 premature deaths have occurred, including four by suicide, under various compelling circumstances as salaries of the workers/employees have been withheld for over 61 months now.”
“The workers, who are alive, are passing their days with unbearable suffering, stress and trauma and have lost all hope to live life with dignity,” Chakraborty said.
On September 28 last year, the Himanta Biswa Sarma-led state government and the workers’ representatives had reached an agreement to resolve their pending issues of salary payment and other dues after a marathon meeting.
According to the agreement, a relief package of Rs 570 crore was to be disbursed for the employees within two months on approval by the National Company Law Tribunal of the proposal submitted by the Assam government.
However, the relief package has not yet been released, the unions say.
“There is uncertainty among the workers again as no one knows what fate has in store for them,” the JACRU president said.
“The only option that remains is to appeal to the citizens of national and international communities to raise a voice for justice to save lives and livelihoods of two lakh youths,” he said.