Kolkata, January 10
Ratan Tata today himself presented his “dream Rs 1 lakh car” at an auto exhibition in New Delhi’s Pragati Maidan, but the car was not manufactured at the company’s mother plant at Singur, near Kolkata, where about 3,500 workers attached to the plant suddenly went on strike last evening protesting against the non-payment of wages.

At the same time, over 500 activists of the Trinamool Congress-backed Bhoomi Raksha Committee and its supporters launched a fresh agitation at Singur today demanding the return of their farmland ‘forcibly’ taken over by the government for Tata Motors. The aggrieved people reiterated that their agitation would continue till their demands were not met.

However, the Tata Motors management said the workers who did not attend duty were not Tata Motor workers but were contractor’s people engaged in the Tata Motors construction work. The contractor firm had been told to immediately settle the workers’ dispute so that the construction work at Singur was not hampered.

BRC leader Becharam Manna, however, warned the Tata Motors management and the state government that they would not allow the construction at Singur to continue if their demands were not met.

The Chief Minister, however, was not worried about the fresh agitation at Singur, which, he alleged, was planned and executed by some vested interests opposing the government’s rapid industrialisation programme with private investment.

He asked the district authorities and the police to clear all obstructions at the Tata Motors plant so that construction could progress smoothly, which had been delayed for over six months due to the farmers’ agitation.