The Hindu : Karnataka News : Rejuvenate printing press, says CPI(M)

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 05, 2007
ePaper

Karnataka

Karnataka

Rejuvenate printing press, says CPI(M)

Special Correspondent

Four government units have stopped work due to lack of maintenance

The Government will allot work to private agencies
Only the Mysore unit is functioning

GULBARGA: The State unit of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Tuesday urged the Government to take immediate steps to rejuvenate the Government Text Book Printing Press in Tumkur, Gulbarga, Mangalore and Dharwad which would ensure employment to contract and casual workers.

Addressing a press conference here, State secretariat member of the CPI(M) Maruti Manpade said that except for the partial functioning of the press in Mysore, which has taken up printing of textbooks as scheduled, the other printing press in Tumkur, Gulbarga, Mangalore and Dharwad could not take up printing of textbooks due to several reasons, including repair.

Referring to the Gulbarga Government Text Book Printing Press, Mr. Manpade said that the press was established in 1974 with a view to print textbooks required for six minority languages.

For the past eight months the press has remained non functional due to repair in the main printing machine.

Order for books

Mr. Manpade said that the Gulbarga press was given an order to print 12 lakh textbooks required for the next academic year. However, so far not one textbook has been printed. The press also lacked staff.

The same was the case with the press in Tumkur, Mangalore and Dharwad.

He said the Government had decided to print 2.68 crore textbooks required for the next academic year and sent the work order to the five printing press.

The Government had also worked out a detailed plan for printing these textbooks with a clear direction to all the printing press that they should print at least 22,000 textbooks each every month.

Due to the delay in printing, he said the Government had now decided to allot the work to private agencies.

This, he said, would sound affect contract labourers working in the government press for the past several years.

Plate-making

The Government, which has also decided to allot preparing plate-making, printing and binding work to three agencies, should immediately stop the proposal and take measures to revive its press in the five centres.

He said that Primary and Secondary Education Minister Basavaraj S. Horatti who had promised to sanction a new printing machine and additional funds for the construction of a new building to house the printing press in Gulbarga two months ago, has not fulfilled it.

The Minister should immediately issue a notification in this regard and ensure the supply of printing machine at the earliest.

The Gulbarga press had a sanctioned work strength of 50 but there were only four permanent staff with the remaining posts remaining vacant.

The entire unit is managed by more than 60 contract labourers.

Meanwhile, in view of these developments, the contract labourers have launched a dharna in protest against the denial of employment to them.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Karnataka