Around 2,000 workers of state owned Alim Jute Mills in Khulna staged protests yesterday against the government’s plans to privatise the industry.
Sources said under the banner of Privatisation Resistance Committee, the workers staged demonstration in front of the mill in the morning.
They also brought out a protest procession and held rally.
Later, they blocked the Khulna-Jessore Highway causing serous sufferings to the commuters.
During the blockade programme several processions were seen on the highway.
A meeting was also held in on the premises of the mill where workers’ leader Abdus Salam Jamaddar, Syful Islam Mintu, Sarder Abdul Hamid, Mujibur Rahman Makbul, Abbas Ali, Iqbal Hossain, Sheikh Zakaria, Anwar Hossain, Abed Ali , Redowan Hossain Bahar, Babul Reza, Akbar Ali, Hafez Abdus Salam and Rafiqul Islam.
The committee convener Md Abdur Rashid presided over the function.
The speakers threatened the government that they would paralyse Khulna city if the authorities concerned did not cancel their decision about privatising the mill immediately.
Rashid said their nine-day protest programmes would end through holding a hunger strike programme.
Jatiya Sramik Federation central president Hafizur Rahman Bhuiyan, in his speech, urged the Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation authorities to arrange adequate allocation of fund to run the mill.
The government announced privatising the Alim Jute Mills about four months back.
According to the Dhaka Tribune reports on 22 May, a cash crunch hit nine state-owned jute mills in Khulna and Jessore regions, with the workers demanding that money be allocated to purchase raw jute.
But the mills’ authorities said this was the result of unsold jute products piling up at the factories and not particularly a financial problem.
In mills where jute has not been stored, however, productions have fallen and workers have not been paid on time.
The reports say, at Alim Jute Mill, production stopped on May 3 because of a shortage of jute and the factory’s privatisation is due.
But Md Abdur Rashid, labour leader at Alim Jute Mill, said workers were fiercely opposed to the idea of privatisation and they would strongly protest against it.