Daijiworld Media Network – Mangalore (SP)

Mangalore, Oct 18: In a joint raid conducted on Monday October 17 by the officials of the department of labour and the local tahsildar, 15 bonded labourers were freed. All of them belonged to a tribal village in West Bengal. They have since been sent to their villages, it is gathered.

The freed labourers belong to Pura block of Pantalia Liakid village, Purulia district, West Bengal, and Katari village in Bankura village, West Bengal. The labourers said that a person named Bolanath Singh from West Bengal had met them when they were reeling under poverty and non-employment, and promised them a monthly pay of Rs 4,000.  Lured by this offer, they said, they had come to the city.

They did not know that before they were brought here, Singh had held talks with GDC Company, which has taken works on contract in Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd and Mangalore Special Economic Zone, for supplying labourers. Besides entering into a sub-lease agreement, he had availed of four lac rupees as advance payment towards their salary, which the labourers did not know. Bolanath Singh had escaped thereafter.

The company put the labourers to work, but paid a measly Rs 70 per week, the workers claimed. During the raid, the government officials held talks with the company officials, and arranged for payment of salary at agreed rate for the period of their work, before despatching the freed labourers to their home state.