Stepping up pressure, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa on Sunday announced state-wide demonstration by her party on July 2 protesting the Centre’s decision to sell five per cent of its stakes in the public sector Neyveli Lignite Corporation.
“I had written to the Prime Minister not to sell five per cent stakes to private players. No action has been taken so far on this, whereas Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal has confirmed that five per cent would be sold to private sector,” she said in a statement here.
To protest against the Centre’s decision to sell the stakes as well as its alleged inaction on her proposal to offer the shares to Tamil Nadu Government-owned public sector undertakings, AIADMK cadres would demonstrate in all district headquarters in the state and Puducherry on July 2, she said.
Listing out her party’s initiatives to thwart such moves by the Centre in the past, she also took an indirect dig at DMK chief M Karunanidhi, saying he had given up his opposition to the stake sale after his daughter Kanimozhi’s victory in the Rajya Sabha polls with Congress support.
A Puducherry report said leaders and workers of various trade unions in the Union Territory will jointly stage a “massive demonstration” there on July 3 to protest disinvestment.
General Secretary of Puducherry unit of the AITUC and Convenor of the all trade unions action committee said in a release that the UPA government’s decision to effect disinvestment of shares in the NLC was a clear case of “killing a goose that lays golden eggs“.
He said representatives of all trade unions including AITUC, LPF, MDMK, Anna Trade Union and BMS have decided to hold the demonstration against the Centre’s “myopic approach and injurious decision to disinvest shares” in NLC.
