VIZIANAGARAM: Rural Development Minister Kimidi Mrunalini performed the puja to mark the beginning of crushing at Sri Vijayarama Gajapathi Cooperative Sugars Limited at Bheemasinghi in Jami mandal at 9.32am on Friday. None of the factory workers was present at the event.
The Minister, MLAs Naraswamy Naidu and Meesala Geeta, Collector Vivek Yadav and factory Managing Director D. Narayana Rao formally dropped sugarcane into the crusher. The target fixed for crushing this season is one lakh tonne. The purchase price of cane for 2016-17 has been fixed at Rs. 2,400 per tonne.
Workers on strike
There are 12 permanent employees, six permanent seasonal workers and 275 non-muster roll (NMR) workers. All the NMRs are on strike for the second day demanding a wage hike of Rs. 100 per day. However, following ‘fruitful talks’ at a later stage between the Minister, the Collector and the representatives of the Bheemasinghi United Sugar Staff and Workers’ Union it has been decided to begin crushing from Monday.
Later, the Minister told mediapersons that the management had agreed to increase wages by Rs. 50 per day from the present Rs. 344. As a result, the cooperative society has to bear an additional burden of Rs. 31 lakh for the season. MLA Kondapalli Appala Naidu, who was present during the talks, said that the society’s accumulated losses over the years, for various reasons, stood at Rs. 42 crore and the APCOB was not ready to lend money to run the factory any more.
Except in 2003-04 season when the government did not permit crushing due to mounting losses, crushing at the factory has been going on since 1976-77 with an average recovery rate of 9 – 9.8 per cent.
The factory has 16,862 shareholders with about 4,000 growers as ‘supply members’ and others as ‘non-supply members’ with a share capital of Rs. 3,290 lakh against the authorised share capital of Rs.4,000 lakh.
