Fates of around 5,000 Balasore Alloys workers and their families hang in balance as the power supply to the company has been snapped owing to nonpayment of energy bill, which is a whopping amount of about Rs 262 crore now.
This a big blow to Baleswar district ahead of festival season for the ferroalloys company as well as the local market. It is also a jolt to the district which couldn’t witness establishment of any big industries post eighties although the Rs ,6000 crore Subarnarekha port and Rs 80,000 crore , a mega project of HPL (Haldia Petrochemicals Limited) are in offing.
According to company profile, Balasore Alloy, formerly Ispat Alloys Li Rs mited, is a part of the renowned ispat group of companies, a major business house in the country, promoted by the Mittals. At present, it has two plants with total capacity of 160,000 MTPA.
The company has 5 furnaces and requires 132 KVA power supply to run the plant. And each month on an average about Rs 20-22 crore bill is generated towards energy consumption. The company is experiencing crisis for last few years due to its bad financial condition.
A Nesco (Northern Electricity Supply Company) official stated that the ferroalloys company was asked to clear the dues repeatedly yet the latter adopted a dillydally approach. Finally, the power supply is severed to the plant
The plant’s production is shut as raw material was not reaching to the plant due to mining problem and now the power supply is severed. While on the one hand the plant production is stalled, on the other, the recognised union of the plant has threatened for agitation.
In a meeting with workers, the Balasore Alloys Employees’ Union president Sudhir Mangaraj alleged that the authorities are shunting out the workers having 20-25 years experience and instead recruiting new people. Further he alleged that although there should be new agreement between the workers union and company, yet the same was not being followed.
Due to autocratic attitude of the company authorities, the union would be forced to undertake agitation, Mangaraj threatened.