Rice mill labourers, staff stare at uncertain future

Labourers and employees working at rice mills of the region are apprehensive of an uncertain future due to the ongoing paddy crisis.

They (labourers and employees) have urged their employers to ensure that milling work is not discontinued due to the ongoing paddy procurement and storage space issues.

Expressing concern over interests of their employees and labourers, rice millers of the region have announced that they would make their efforts to keep their plants running even under adverse circumstances.

Migrant labourers, led by Parmeshar Pal, district president of Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC), alleged that a political feud between the Centre and the Punjab Government had resulted in a situation wherein rice millers had started showing inability to run their mills according to changed rice policy. “Having suffered due to defective policies of the Centre regarding procurement and processing of paddy during the past few years, thousands of labourers working at rice mills have started feeling insecure about their future,” said Pal.

Rice millers regretted that the successive governments had not bothered to comprehend that the rice sheller industry had emerged as a frontier sector in providing employment to lakhs of youths, including Punjab residents and migrants.

“Unfortunately, none of the successive governments ever bothered to recognise our industry as a platform to improve the lives of lakhs of families depending on our employees and labourers,” said Sanjiv Somi, a rice miller of the region.

Somi argued that the quantum of work allotted to a particular rice mill did not decide the profitability of the owners only, rather it ultimately affected the income of labourers too, who are paid remuneration according to the work allotted and accomplished.

“As we are not in a position to employ permanent and regular labour, we have to hire a workforce on contract who are paid on per bag rates. Not only the number of consignments allotted to a rice mill but the pace of allotment also affects the income of labour hired on contract,” said Somi.

Vijay Kakria, another rice sheller, said the owners had to run their mills to save the interests of labour and prevent the wastage of establishment charges, including fix fee being levied by Punjab State Power Corporation Limited and other departments.

“As majority of rice mill owners have made advance payments to labourers and have to pay fixed charges, they can’t afford to stop their machines,” said Kakria, regretting that the rice millers of the state were made to follow the same policy as applied to Haryana, but had to face adverse circumstances.

Kakria alleged that electricity, the major input, was three times costlier in Punjab in comparison to Haryana.