Demand on social media to reopen Wimco, Dhubri's lone industrial unit

A CORRESPONDENT

DHUBRI: Demand is growing on social media these days to reopen Wimco, the lone industrial identity of Dhubri district. Ardent social worker, Dipankar Mazumdar has been getting tremendous feedback and support for his campaign to revive the century-old and historical industrial unit of the district.

In his post on social media, Mazumdar stated that the prevailing poor socio-economic condition of people living in this district called for revival of this match factory. "Western India Match Company (Wimco) was a medium-scale industry established by a Swedish company in 1925 with total strength of 2,287 workers, staff and officials," Mazumdar further stated.

It ran for over 71 years smoothly but due to ban on felling trees by the Supreme Court and militancy, the company reportedly had to close down this industrial unit in 1996, he said. He pointed out a conspiracy that was hatched between the management and labour union leaders. He said that the process of closure started after 1992 and under this secret plan, it was closed within a span of four years.

Tree felling banned by the Supreme Court was only confined to reserve forest area and woods required for the match factory were of soft wood variety like Simul, Kadam and other soft wood grown in the unclassified forest areas and felling of these trees was not banned, Mazumdar further pointed out. He alleged that on the plea and pretext of ban, the company very tactically moved forward to wind up the industry.

Sources said that later the entire land measuring around 175 bighas along with infrastructure was sold to ITC business group in 2001. People of Dhubri hoped that business giant ITC would set up some industry on the said land but 20 years have elapsed since it took over the possession of Wimco and unfortunately till now the group has not started any new industrial unit here.

"Having studied the pros and cons of Wimco's closure and given the socio-economic condition of the people of Dhubri district where no industry worth the name exists, we have started this movement for its revival with the hope that you all support and bring back smiles on the face of people," Mazumdar appealed on social media.

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