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TE workers stage massive protest against cashless wage policy

By Staff Correspondent

DIBRUGARH, Jan 19 - Thousands of tea garden workers today staged demonstrations on National and State Highways across the State in protest against the alleged arbitrary halt to the traditional cash wages and imposing the cashless system in the tea estates as also for the proposed move of the government to monetize all fringe benefits of the workers, like rations, firewood, tea leaves, etc.

Demonstrations were organised in more than 20 locations in this district. The protests were organised simultaneously in Borborooah, Khanikar, Lahoal, Tengakhat, Dikom, Nudwa Siding, Khowang, Moran, Sepon, Thowra, Tingrai, Duliajan, Naholia, Bokuloni, Bhadoi Paanchali, Ouphulia, Pithagooti, Dirai, Rajgarh, Naharkatia, Joypur, Teenali and Bamunbari. The State-wide protest call was made by the Assam Chah Mazddor Sangha (ACMS). The workers moved out of their tea garden enclaves with placards and banners and raised anti-government slogans and staged road blockades for about 30 minutes.

Former Union Minister and Assam Chah Mazdoor Sangha (ACMS) president Paban Singh Ghatowar spearheaded the biggest demonstrations of all at Lahoal near here, where thousands of plantation workers blocked the National Highway and the Lahoal-Naharkatia road for about 30 minutes.

Ghatowar led the protest march from the Muttuck tea estate ground to Lahoal petrol depot and back to Lahoal intersection. Tea workers from some 16 nearby tea gardens participated in the rally at Lahoal.

Ghatowar in his public address said that the government�s anti-worker policies will not be accepted under any circumstances and that the ACMS would continue to oppose it. He demanded restoration of the earlier system of cash wages to the workers, stating that the payment of wages through banks and ATMs was causing immense hardships to the illiterate workers. �The government must understand that illiterate workers cannot operate ATMs or bank accounts. The cashless system is not at all practical in plantations in the present scenario,� he reiterated.

On the proposed monetization of the fringe benefits of the plantation workers, Ghatowar warned the government against taking any such move.

He said that workers who draw low wages cannot afford to purchase those essentials from the open market.

Former Labour and Employment and Tea and Ex Tea Tribes Welfare Minister Atuwa Munda also took part in the protest rallies held in Bamunbari and Rajgarh in Tingkhong.

Commuters had a harrowing time as they were stranded at different places of all the Highways.

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