More than 85 per cent of the nearly five lakh lorries in the State kept off the road on Friday in response to the indefinite strike called by the All India Motor Transport Congress (AIMTC) and the State Federation of Lorry Owners Association (SFLOATN), said K. Nallathambi, president of the federation.
Many vehicles owned by members of associations that had earlier refused to join the strike were also off the road, he told The Hindu .
“According to government records, there are 4,91,535 trucks – including trailers, containers and tankers – in the State”, he said and expressed confidence that more than 95 per cent of them would stop operations from Saturday.
Nearly 2.88 crore eggs remained uncleared in the district on Friday as poultry farmers extended their support to the strike for the first two days (Friday and Saturday). Chairman of the National Egg Coordination Committee (NECC), Namakkal Zone, P. Selvaraj, said that the lorry associations and federation in Karnataka had exempted the poultry industry from the strike. It would be good if a similar exemption was given to the poultry industry here.
