Dispute In Irugur Container Depo

Dispute over right to work among headload workers has affected the functioning of the container depot at Irugur on the outskirts of the city. Southern Railway developed a container depot for cargo handling at the Irugur Railway Station in a bid to reduce the workload at North Coimbatore Junction and minimise the entry of trucks into city. But North Coimbatore Junction continued to handle cargo and the cargo handling and forwarding agencies continued to operate from there.

Irugur being on the outskirts of the city and well connected by bypass road, served as an ideal location for container depot. The depot has two cargo releasing lines. Work on one line has been completed. The depot started operations nearly one year ago. The cargo lines can accommodate 40 wagons at any given time. The depot was handling commodities such as food grains, cement, poultry feed and a number of other items. The first labour unrest erupted immediately after commencing the cargo operations. Headload workers of the North Coimbatore Junction demanded right to employment and priority over cargo workers from Irugur, Singanallur and Ondipudur.

The dispute was referred to the Central Assistant Commissioner of Labour. Trade unions moved the Madras High Court against the decision stating that major trade unions were not consulted. The case is pending disposal. Southern Railway officials expressed concern when consignees started taking the “short cargo” to Tirupur, Erode and even Salem. This has resulted in headload workers losing jobs and truckers their earnings.

The Revenue Divisional Officers, M. Balachandran (Coimbatore) and B. Murugesh (Tirupur), held talks with trade union representatives and railway officials at Coimbatore on Tuesday. The meeting resolved to wait till the case was disposed by the High Court. Cargo operations could continue according to the interim decision by the then Assistant Commissioner of Police (Law and Order-East), at a meeting held on August 18, 2007. It stipulated that trade unions would get the agreed share of work in terms of the number of wagons that arrived in a rake of one goods train.

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