Opposing the "hurried" initiative by Roy Chowdhury, all the employees' unions have written to the Prime Minister, Election Commission, Central Vigilance Commission and Central labour commissioner, seeking their intervention to stop the move.
There are eight labour unions affiliated to different parties and an officers' forum representing all categories of DVC employees. These unions met on Wednesday and Thursday in preparation of an agitation to resist the sale. A mass signature campaign is also on among the 11,000 employees.
The employees' petitions also accuse the chairman of trying to pressure senior officials into signing the MoU with the West Bengal government for the sale. Company sources said three executive directors — Tapan Bandopadhyay, A Nayak and D Mitra — attended a meeting with officials of West Bengal State Electricity Distribution Company Ltd (WBSEDCL) on April 18 and were asked to sign the pre-written MoU.
They, however, refused to sign the MoU and noted on file that the discussion was inconclusive. The sources said one of three executive directors received a call on April 20 from the chairman who asked him to speed up the signing of the MoU. The ED is understood to have replied that there were legal aspects that needed to be fixed first.
The following day, a meeting of top DVC executives was called at the company's headquarters in Kolkata. Minutes of the meeting show Bandopadhyay as informing the 27 attending members that the next board meeting, scheduled for April 25, would take up the proposal for sale. The proposal also envisages transferring the ownership of Durgapur barrage and the company's irrigation system to the West Bengal government. Bandopadhyay said the chairman has advised these issues be discussed with senior DVC executives and asked for the opinion of the House to be conveyed to him.
At the meeting, all the 27 executives signed a resolution against the plan to sell the HT grid or the Durgapur barrage and irrigation system to the West Bengal government, as it would amount to huge losses and collapse of DVC.
They also appealed the chairman to resolve the issue of pending dues from the Jharkhand government that amounts to Rs 4,200 crore, including Rs 1,629 crore of penalty for delayed payment.
A notice circulated on April 21 said that the board meeting of April 25 had been postponed while a meeting is scheduled for April 28 at the power ministry.
Earlier, DVC Karmachari Sangh (INTUC) had written to Special Election Observer (West Bengal) Sudhir Kumar Rakesh on April 18, 2014. "Contradicting provisions of the DVC Act, 1948, the temporary chairman is hell bent to hand over the grid to facilitate the business of NTPC with active collusion of a specific political party. In view of this, you are requested to restrain the DVC management from taking any such major decision regarding the structural change of the corporation scheduled to be held in the board meeting going to be held on April 25, 2014, that is before completion of the election process and formation of the new government at the Centre," said the letter. This union is headed by Congress leader Adhir Chowdhury.
Accusing the management of trying to "dismantle DVC", the CITU affiliated DVC Shramik Union, headed by CPM MP Basudeb Acharia, wrote to the chairman on April 18, saying, "Since DVC was set up under an Act of Parliament, any change on handing over of part thereof to any other agencies should be done after discussion in Parliament." Copies of the letter were forwarded to CEC V S Sampath, joint secretary (thermal) in the power ministry and top DVC officials.
In a memorandum to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on April 21, Trinamool Congress affiliated DVC Kamgar Sangh sought his intervention to halt the process saying, "DVC chairman picked the time of general elections when everyone is busy with election campaign ... though there is a code of conduct across the country ... Why is he so eager to transfer the DVC grid?"
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