Strike at onion market in Dindigul

Normal business activity has been badly hit

November 23, 2020 06:22 pm | Updated 06:22 pm IST

Load men staging a dharna in Dindigul on Monday.

Load men staging a dharna in Dindigul on Monday.

DINDIGUL

A rift between an office-bearer of the Loadmen Workers' Welfare Association and the merchants' association here resulted in a strike at the Onion Market situated on the Dindigul-Karur by-pass road on Monday.

According to the merchants association, there were over 100 onion merchants selling the produce to wholesale buyers.

Shallots arrive here from Tirupur, Coimbatore, Tiruchi, Perambalur, Dindigul, Theni and Karur districts, while big onions were procured from Maharashtra and Karnataka.

There were about 300 men and women working here in loading and off-loading consignments from trucks. They were affiliated to a trade union in which Thomayar was the secretary.

It is alleged that for some time, there was a rift between a few merchants and Mr. Thomayar. Repeated pleas not to intervene in the daily activities by the workers' association's office-bearer had fallen in deaf ears, the merchants said.

On the other side, the trade union office-bearer denied it and claimed that he intervened only in the workers’ interests. As there seemed to be no consensus, the workers announced a strike from Monday. The workers’ union stayed away from their work. They were led by president Sirumani and Durairaj from AITUC.

As the standoff was unresolved, the normal business activity at the market got badly hit. Truck loads of onions from many districts could not be off-loaded.

In the meantime, a group of merchants lodged a complaint with the Thadicombu police and wanted protection so that they would bring in workers from outside and engage them in the loading/unloading activity.

A senior officer said that they were holding talks with the two sides and hoped to resolve the issue soon.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.