Poor response to bandh in Nellore

Nellore/Kadapa: The bandh call against the privatisation of Visakhapatnam Steel Plant has received poor response in the district. TDP, CPM, CPI, IFTU, AIFTU, student, and other organisations participated in the protest at Gandhi Statue Centre on Friday and raised slogans against the government for privatising the plant.

The protesters obstructed RTC bus services till afternoon. The leaders who participated in the protest said that the plant spread over 25,000 acres with an annual production capacity of 7.3 million tonnes of steel, has 16,000 employees and 17,500 contract employees. Besides it, the plant was providing indirect employment for around 1 lakh people. They said the privatization move would hit the livelihood of thousands of people in the city.

They said the plant has been facing difficult situation due to lack of own iron ore sources. Even private players like SR Tata, Mittal, Adani, POSCO, Jindal and others were getting mines at nominal costs where the Navratna Company has been lacking such support from the rulers, they charged.

They said the value of lands owned by VSP was around Rs 1.10 lakh crores and cost of machines would be around Rs 1 lakh crores and the BJP government was planning to hand over the entire property to the private players at a cheaper cost. They appealed Centre to revoke the move.

TDP leaders SK Abdul Aziz, K Srinivasulu Reddy, CPI district secretary Ch Prabhakar, IFTU leader Sagar Babu, AIFTU leader Yanadaiah, AITUC leader D Ankaiah, and others were present.

In Kadapa, the bandh was by and large peaceful. Mydukuru town CPI secretary K Sivaram urged people to voluntarily join the stir in the interest of protecting steel plant.