Union Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi has assured a CPI delegation that the Centre will make arrangements to bring back Indian workers in Angola who were not willing to work there anymore.
The delegation comprising CPI State secretary K. Narayana and State general secretary of All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and MLC P.J. Chandrasekhar called on the Union Minister, who is on a visit to the State, and requested him to intervene in the issue of Indian workers' plight in Angola.
About 1,500 workers including 450 from Andhra Pradesh, were working in Angola for a cement industry. The workers were sent there by two agencies EPA Star Company and SPKF Company, the CPI leaders explained.
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The cement unit management was not paying salaries to the workers since January and when they agitated the local police had allegedly opened fire against them injuring four of them seriously. Some of them were also sent to jail.
The workers were being harassed by the management and most of them were willing to return home. However, their passports and visas were in the custody of the company management.