The Hindu Business Line : Militant unionism a thing of the past: Buddhadeb

EVEN as he presented a case on West Bengal's attractiveness as an investment destination before the Consular Corps of Kolkata here on Wednesday, the Chief Minister, Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, emphatically stated that the days of militant trade unionism in West Bengal were over and no form of "hooliganism" would be tolerated.

Speaking at a function held here under the aegis of the Consular Corps of Kolkata to release a publication titled "A Resurgent West Bengal" based on the proceedings of a business seminar held in November 2003, Mr Bhattacharjee said it was important to "reform or you perish".

However, the West Bengal Government was keen to facilitate economic reforms "with a human face" and where the interests of the workers and farmers were protected and jobs are created.

In this context, he mentioned the restructuring of 56 identified State-owned enterprises in a phased manner.

"These units had been put up with private funds and we had to take them over since they were not doing well. But now, we have to restructure them since we cannot go on sustaining the losses", he said, and added that the State was opposed to privatisation of profit-making enterprises that had been set up with public funds.

Mr Bhattacharjee urged the foreign companies to invest in West Bengal and said the State had no hidden agenda.

"Please come and invest for our mutual interest. You earn your profits but please provide jobs to the workers here", he said.

He also sought to allay apprehensions that the State Government was not in tune with the Centre's thinking on economic policies and reforms and, hence, the issue was a matter of concern with prospective investors.

He said the State Government and the Centre were working together for development and growth, with special focus on the agriculture and rural sectors.

Earlier, the West Bengal's Minister for Information Technology, Mr Manab Mukherjee, called for the need to bridge the gap between West Bengal's "true investment worthiness" and the perception of the same among the investing community.

He quoted a publication that had ranked the State's investment worthiness at No 5 but ranked the State at No 25 in terms of perception.

According to Mr Erhard Zander, Chairman of the Consular Corps of Kolkata Business Seminar Committee, several business delegations from abroad had already come to Kolkata following last year's business seminar. These include business delegations from the US, UK, Germany, France, Denmark, Australia, Italy and Spain, among others.

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