Five years after closure, Vijayamohini mills employees seek its reopening

Five years after the shutting down of the Vijayamohini Mills in Thiruvananthapuram in the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak, the mill is yet to be reopen. Vijayamohini Mills is one of the 23 spinning mills of the National Textile Corporation.

Five years after the shutting down of the Vijayamohini Mills in Thiruvananthapuram in the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak, the mill is yet to be reopen. Vijayamohini Mills is one of the 23 spinning mills of the National Textile Corporation.

Employees, who have been left in the lurch due to the long years of closure, sat on a day night protest on Saturday and Sunday demanding reopening and provision of benefits including pending wages. The Vijayamohini Mills in the capital is one of the five spinning mills in Kerala under the NTC - Kerala Lekshmi Mill and Alagappa Textiles in Thrissur, and the CS&W Mills in Kannur and Mahe being the other - which have remained closed ever since the pandemic. Many of these mills which began under private ownership in the 19th or early 20th century, were brought under the public sector in the early 1970s. The NTC took over the Vijayamohini Mills in 1973. Post the lockdown in 2020, the salary was first cut by 25%, by 40% the next month and by 60% later that year. The company now has 400 workers under the permanent and casual categories. Around 150 casual workers from this mill alone lost their jobs much before the lockdown. While the permanent employees continue to draw meagre salary payment, the temporary staff and their families have been struggling to stay afloat, according to union leaders. Though the mill reopened in 2021, it closed again after 45 days. Even during the short period of reopening, temporary workers were not called back. “The Vijayamohini mills have been for a long time working in profits, providing a stable job and benefits for many families. However, the wrong policies of the NTC has led to the mill’s continued lockdown as well as landed many families which were dependent on the mill for their survival in dire straits,” says M.T. Antony, secretary of the Trivandrum Textile Workers’ Union, affiliated to the CITU. All the major trade unions are united in their demands to reopen the mill. CITU State vice president S.Pushpalatha inaugurated the Save NTC day night protest in front of the mill on Saturday, while District Textile Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS) Jyothish Kumar also spoke. On Sunday, Congress leader K.Muraleedharan inaugurated the protest.