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Tata Engineering declares lockout in Lucknow after violence, police firing

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

Lock-out was declared in the local unit of Tata Engineering and Locomotive Company or TELCO following large-scale violence and arson, provoking police firing that left several injured on late Tuesday night.

According to District Magistrate Sanjay Agarwal , who personally rushed to the spot together with the district police chief B B Bakshi, "trouble began around 9.30 pm when hundreds of employees torched the administrative building of the truck manufacturing unit and attacked policemen."

TELCO general manager C B Singh, who was escorted out under heavy police security, told rediff.com, "Employees have been demanding parity in wages with their counterparts in the TELCO establishments at Jamshedpur and Pune; our plea expressing our inability to meet their demand however fell on deaf ears, even as we had offered a general monthly hike of Rs 2000."

He lamented that employees had taken recourse to such vandalism bringing into disrepute to one of the prominent industrial houses of the country.

Employees union president Ajay Yadav, however, maintained, "Management's attempt to intimidate the employees with the use of police force provoked the employees." Flatly denying employees' involvement in the arson that left the computer room in the main administrative building completely charred, he claimed, "The building was set ablaze by persons belonging to the management simply because they wanted to defame the workers."

According to him, employees were only staging a peaceful demonstration in pursuance of their demand for parity in wages. His claim was, however, contradicted by district police officials who happened to be present on the spot.

A senior police official said, "The policemen were attacked no sooner than they tried to escort the general manager out of the factory after we could smell danger to his life." He said, "the general manager had been in virtual captivity of the employees since the morning and had been subjected to severe humiliation and intimidation."

In their bid to restrain the police from taking away the general manager, the employees clashed with the police that eventually led to arson .

As flames emerged from the first floor computer room of the building, some employees jumped from the rooftop, leaving one of the employees' leaders with several spinal injuries. The free-for-all that lasted nearly an hour also caused injuries to a number of policemen including a superintendent of police, officials confirmed.

The TELCO unit here has been facing trouble right from its inception with local farmers repeatedly raising their demand for higher and higher compensation for their land that was acquired for the purpose of setting up this factory. Bhartiya Kisan Union chief Mahendra Singh Tikait had also been backing the local farmers who were now also demanding jobs in the company.

Sick and tired of the recurring nuisance, the management had often over the past threatened to shut down this unit, that had already not been doing too well and had switched over to a four-day week schedule.

Closure of this unit would be a serious setback to the industrialisation promotion programme of Uttar Pradesh because the Lucknow unit of TELCO is considered prestigious.

Business

Uttar Pradesh