At a time when thousands of employees of the Rashtriya Ispat Nigam, also known as Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, have been agitating for the last eight months in protest against the Narendra Modi government’s move to privatise the steel plant, national BJP general secretary Daggubati Purandeshwari sought to play a cruel joke on them.
On Saturday, Purandeshwari said the steel plant would not be shifted anywhere after privatisation and it would remain in Visakhapatnam only. She sought to allay the fears of the steel plant that there would be no threat to their jobs.
“The employees don’t have to be afraid that the privatisation would affect their employment. We shall see that the interests of the employees would be protected and they get a better package,” she said.
But what Purandeshwari failed to understand is that the employees of the steel plant were never afraid that the steel plant would be shifted.
They were strongly opposing the privatisation process as a whole, because the Narendra Modi government was trying to hand over the assets of the steel plant with lakhs of crores of rupees to the private companies for a few thousand crores of rupees.
“The Vizag steel plant represents the self-respect of the Telugu people who achieved it after decades of struggle and loss of scores of people’s lives. Who is Purandeshwari to talk about packages,” a steel plant employee said.
The employees pointed out that despite lack of its own captive mines and high production cost, the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant has been achieving highest turnover in the last one and a half years. In 2020-21, it clocked a turnover of Rs 18,000 crore, the second highest since its inception.
In August this year, the RINL put up best-ever sales value Rs 2,612 crore, the third best turnover for any month. Last year same month, the RIN achieved a turnover of Rs 1176 crore. Thus, this year, it registered a growth of 122 percent.
According to experts, sales is the only avenue by which a company earns its revenue and makes the way to turnaround towards earning profit and steady growth of net worth.
Through a couple of letters and a resolution in the assembly, the Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy government contended the losses and loan liability faced by RINL could be overcome and put on a profitable path if captive iron mines and mobilisation of fresh funds through IPO route are explored.
The chief minister went on record on several occasions that they will issue no objection if part of its surplus lands are taken up for monetisation.
