No work in Singur factory morning after resolution

Bombay News.Net
Monday 8th September, 2008 (IANS)

No employee of Tata Motors or its contractors had entered the factory in Singur Monday morning, the day after an agreement was reached to lift the siege on it, local residents said, as the company refused comment.

A Tata Motors spokesperson refused comment on whether work at the factory slated to make the world's cheapest car Nano would resume Monday. The factory in West Bengal Hooghly district is about 40 km from here.

West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi had Sunday mediated a pact between main opposition Trinamool Congress and the state government over the disputed farmland acquired for the project.

After the long-standing imbroglio was resolved Sunday night, Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee called off her 15-day-long siege of the plant.

But on Monday morning, asked if the work would be resumed, a Tata Motors' spokesperson said: 'I do not have any comments'.

Asked about its reaction on the accord reached between the government and the opposition party on the Singur impasse Sunday night, the company once again refused to comment.

Tata Motors, which is building a factory for the world's cheapest car priced at Rs.100,000 ($2,500) in Singur, last week stopped work indefinitely at the project site following an agitation by farmers led by opposition parties. The farmers, protesting against land acquisition, laid siege to the factory and even assaulted its employees.

As per Sunday's agreement that ended the siege, the state government will form a committee to look into the affected farmers' demands. It will give its report in seven days. Till then the construction of the ancillary units will be on hold, said Gandhi, with state's Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and opposition party supremo Mamata Banerjee at his side.

The agreement said the government 'has taken the decision to respond to the demand of those farmers who have not received compensation, by means of land to be provided to the maximum within the project area and the rest in adjacent areas as early as possible'.

'Towards this, a committee will be constituted to ascertain the scope and settle the modalities within a period of one week. During this time, the government will urge the vendors not to make any construction,' according to the text of the pact inked by Industries Minister Nirupam Sen and Leader of Opposition Partha Chattopadhyay.

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