Morbi ceramics units end strike on govt assurance.

GANDHINAGAR: Morbi's ceramics unit owners on Saturday called off their 23-day-old strike following assurances from the Gujarat government to solve their pending issues.

A leader of Morbi Ceramic Industry Association Sukhdev Patel said, "Cabinet ministers Nitin Patel and Saurabh Patel met us and assured to consider all our demands. Hence from today, we have called off our long strike."

During their agitation, the unit owners had taken up their issues both at the state and central levels. They had even met President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Their demands included reduction in excise duty, 10 per cent rebate on export, alterative supply of gas to the ceramic industry, allowing coal gas based gasifiers and imposition of anti-dumping duty on China.

There were around 600 ceramics industrial units in Morbi that had gone on strike since November 27 after Gujarat high court prohibited use of illegal coal gasifiers following a public interest litigation concerning pollution. The unit owners started switching to natural gas, which is almost four times more expensive than coal gas, but could not compete with competitors from north Gujarat, where gas is available much cheaper than in Morbi.

Many workers had started searching for work in agriculture besides other odd labour jobs. Besides skilled labour, Morbi's ceramics industry provides employment to over 3 lakh people directly and indirectly, which includes packaging, loading and unloading among others.

Of the total labour workforce, about 70 per cent come from Odisha, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and tribal belts of Gujarat. Most of them had gone back home. There are roughly 1,000 contractors providing labourers to Morbi units. In addition to this around 4,000 trucks used for transportation of produce had also come to a halt.

Source : timesofindia.indiatimes.com