Amid raging protests against the Centre’s move to privatise the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (VSP) in Andhra Pradesh, the growing agitation in the neighbouring State is finding resonance in Madharam of Karepalli mandal in Telangana’s mineral-rich Khammam district, where the VSP’s captive dolomite mine is located.
Taking a cue from the mounting anti-privatisation stir in the coastal city of Visakhapatnam and elsewhere in Andhra Pradesh, several trade unions operating in the Madharam dolomite mining belt have embarked on a phase-wise agitation against the Centre’s privatisation move.
The Madharam Dolomite Mine (MDM) was commissioned in 1989 as a captive mine of the Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited (RINL)-VSP with 1500 tonnes per day capacity at Madharam in Khammam district in the then united Andhra Pradesh, sources said.
Around 950 acres of land spread in five gram panchayats in and around Madharam was allotted for the MDM in the last 80s, sources added.
The mining operations are currently under way in the core mining zone of a little over 100 acres. It has around 160 regular employees including workers on its rolls apart from nearly 60 contract workers.
In the wake of the Centre’s move to privatise the VSP, local leaders of the CITU, the INTUC and the AITUC launched a relay hunger stir in front of the MDM on Friday demanding withdrawal of the Centre's privatisation plan.
“We have submitted memoranda to the mandal and the district authorities against the move to privatise our public sector undertaking in the past one week,” said G Narasimha Rao, CITU Madharam committee secretary.
“The move to privatise our parent organisation (VSP) will eventually result in the MDM going into the hands of private players thereby jeopardising the interests of the workforce,” he deplored, reiterating that they would organise a phase-wise agitation above trade union affiliations to avert privatisation of the VSP/MDM.
The long-pending grievances of several land losers of the dolomite mining area still remained unaddressed, alleged a local trade union activist.
“Privatisation will allow big private firms to plunder the rich mineral wealth at the cost of the workers’ welfare and the environment, the activist alleged.
“We will mount pressure on the Centre to drop the privatisation move to safeguard the public sector mine and livelihoods of the workforce,” he asserted.
