NLC contract workmen yet to get June wages

The 13,000-strong contract workmen of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation are yet to get the wages for the month of June.

It is customary for the contractors to disburse the wages for any particular month to the workmen on the 6th or 7th of the succeeding month. As all of them are now on strike the payment is yet to be made.

D. Loganathan, secretary, NLC Builders’ Association of India (in which the contractors are members) said the disbursement could not materialise because the contractors could not get the attendance registers.

Only on the basis of the attendance registers, the wages would be calculated and disbursed.

For June, the contractors were yet to get the registers. However, in case of regular employees, salary has already been credited to their account, since they went on strike only from July 3.

BAI extends support

It was the responsibility of the contractors to mobilise the required workforce for a particular job. Once the process of regularisation of the contract workmen was initiated through INDCOSERVE, about 5,000 contract workmen would be taken out of the rolls of the contractors.

Under such circumstances, the contractors would have to seek fresh tenders to gather adequate manpower. Asked whether the ongoing strike had put any pressure on them as they would have to meet the deadline in completing a task, Mr. Loganathan said,

“There is absolutely no pressure of any sorts from the management in this regard.”

The builders association was backing the trade unions Mr. Loganathan said categorically answering a query on their support to the ongoing stir at NLC.

Financial burden

Admitting that the strike would impose financial burden on the contractors as they would have to pay the wages to the supervisors, Mr. Loganathan ruled out the possibility of engaging casual workers to run the facilities in the NLC.