Assam refinery fears that rumours of labourers’ exodus may affect expansion work

Numaligarh Refinery Limited in Assam faces labor shortage due to migrant worker exodus amid social tensions, impacting expansion projects.

GUWAHATI

A public sector refinery in eastern Assam’s Golaghat district fears the “rumours” surrounding the exodus of labourers from the region could affect its expansion work.

A few instances of migrant workers, especially Bengali Muslims, leaving Sivasagar, Charaideo, and other urban centres of eastern Assam were reported following outrage over the alleged gang rape of a 14-year-old Assamese girl in Nagaon district’s Dhing on August 22. One of the three people, a Bengali Muslim, suspected to have committed the crime died in police custody.

The 3 million metric tonnes per annum (MMTPA) Numaligarh Refinery Limited (NRL), about 260 km east of Guwahati, is undergoing expansion to increase its capacity to 9 MMTPA. The project is expected to be completed by 2025.

The refinery is also racing against time to complete a bamboo-fed second-generation bioethanol plant with an installed capacity of 186 kilolitres per day. The targeted completion of this project is September.

“We have about 11,000 labourers engaged in the two projects. They are a mix of local and migrant labourers and some 150-200 of the latter category left following rumours about the exodus of people belonging to a minority community leaving the place,” a senior NRL officer said, declining to be quoted.

He said members of some 30 organisations representing indigenous communities have recently requested NRL to give preference to locals for menial jobs. “They, however, did not demand that the non-local or migrant labourers should be removed from the projects or told to go,” he added.