By Ruma Dubey

West Bengal is yet to get over the image bashing it got after the Tata Motors Nano fiasco and now there is one more which the State will find it very difficult to get over.  

Eyebrows went up in surprise when last week ABG - ABG Haldia Bulk Terminals’ (HBT) announced that it was pulling out of Haldia Port. There was no disbelief or utter shock; and that is the scary part. When something as huge as this has happened, we are not shaken, maybe because this happened in West Bengal; had it been Maharashtra or Gujarat or even Manesar, we would have been shocked.

The roads leading to the Haldia docks are usually bustling with noise, trucks and tankers plying and honking away to glory. Today, there is an eerie silence on the roads, except for the intermittent voice from a loudspeaker, perched atop a vehicle, urging the laborers at Haldia port to stay together and not believe ‘rumours’.

Why did ABG pull out? It has stated that the environment was not secure for working after there was news of some its employees’ being abducted. ABG said that the state Govt, which is the TMC, failed to provide necessary protection to the cargo handler’s employees against assaults and physical intimidation by retrenched workers and political activists. Mamata Banerjee, pooh-poohed this news and stated that the media was spreading rumours and all was well at Haldia.

But those on the ground say that things at Haldia are currently worse than what had happened at Singur. It first began with a fight between HBT and Kolkatta Port Trust (KPT). HBT complained that it was not getting enough cargo and KPT stated that it had not entered into any ‘minimum cargo’ contract with HBT. Also HBT alleged that despite having mechanized cargo unloading facilities, KPT was sending cargo to ports which had manual unloading, only because some of these were ‘related’ to TMC.

As though this back and forth allegations were not enough things got bad when on 24th Sept, HBT sacked 275 workers, all of them belonging to the TMC union. This triggered a massive protest from the employee unions. Things went to the Court and it ordered the State to provide security to HBT workers at the dock, for which HBT forked out a fat sum of Rs.1.75 lakh/day for 65 policemen. The court also asked HBT and KPT to settle all its cargo issues. But the ‘manual’ cargo companies felt that this meant the Court was settling in favour of HBT and they started agitating, gheraoed KPT offices. And in this tense atmosphere, the last straw was when three HBT officials and the family of one of them were alleged abducted at gunpoint. They were put on a Kolkatta train and warned to never return back to Haldia. The police stated that no one was abducted and the officials had left on their own free will. There is also news that HBT is floating all these ‘stories’ to get out of Haldia as it was not making profits. Somehow, all this reeks of major trouble and TMC has a track record of always alluding realities. After all, the TMC chief had stormed out of a TV program when some students asked her difficult questions, saying that they were planted there by the Maoists!

Irrespective of the truth, this is very bad news for West Bengal. Mamata drove out Tata Motors and the state is yet to get over that when this news has come in. With HBT pulling out, the unemployment it will cause is another big issue looming large. Laborers at HBT, holed up at home, are scared to even talk to the media. Is this the ‘free’ India we are living in, 65 years after we got our independence? With HBT pulling out, wonder how uneasy those with industries in West Bengal are feeling today.

This situation is more sinister than Singur as a fully set up company has complained of no support from the state administration and a belligerent trade union which is linked to the current ruling party in West Bengal.