Assam: One more employee dead of the defunct HPC paper mill, toll rises to 109

One more employee of the defunct Cachar Paper Mill, now taken over by Government of Assam, died of severe health complications and failure to afford the required medical treatment in due time. 

The deceased employee has been identified as Anil Baraik, a resident of Thaligram, Udharband in Cachar district of Assam who died on Saturday, August 6 at a private nursing home in Silchar.

Baraik was suffering from severe Neuro Diseases, was partially paralysed & other serious complications. Failure to afford desired treatment in time due to financial crisis owing to non-payment of salary since last 65 months, led to Baraik’s untimely death at the age of 56.

With this, the death toll of employees touched 109, of which most of them died of poverty, trauma, and lack of medical treatment, since the state’s two paper mills, one in Nagaon and the other in Cachar, stopped functioning, said the Joint Action Committee of Recognized Unions (JACRU).

“Fortunately, Govt of Assam came forward with a Relief Package & started disbursement of Relief Package includes a portion of Salary approximately of about 16 months from the GoA to save lives under the kind & dymanic leadership Dr. Himanta Biswa Sharma, it is pertinent to note that the irreparable damages already caused earlier, now resulting premature deaths one after another, thus the responsibilities of all such deaths rest on the Government of India & earlier CM of Assam respectively who failed to resolve the crisis in time,” mentioned Ananda Bordoloi, the General Secretary of JACRU via a communiqué. 

Bordoloi further mentions in the communiqué, “A Govt. Of India Owned Industries has turned to Valley of Death as like as Holocaust only because of Irresponsible , Inhuman & Hostile approach of the Government at Centre. While Natural Justice is Rejected by, A native Government & Inhuman Torture increases, the Only option remain open & that is CITIZEN'S COURT" of National & International Communities.”

The two paper mills – Cachar Paper Mill at Panchgram in Hailakandi district and Nagaon Paper Mill at Jagiroad in Morigaon district, have been lying dysfunctional since October 2015 and March 2017 respectively. The employees have not received salaries for the last 65 months. Even though the state government announced a slew of relief packages of about 16 months, the progression of crisis had already begun with the government’s help coming in late.