CALCUTTA, 13 March 2005 — A high court judge has criticized the West Bengal government for not implementing his order and ordered the administration to pay 260 million rupees for its blunder.
Justice Ashim Kumar Banerjee slammed the communist administration yesterday in the Dunbar Mills case. The mill’s assets were sold Dec. 7 for 260 million rupees to Amtec Dealer Private Limited at an auction in the High Court premises ordered by Banerjee. Amtec promptly deposited the amount in the court within days.
The court appointed a liquidator to take possession of the mill’s assets and hand them over to Amtec. But the liquidator failed to enter the closed mill because of stiff resistance by workers led by the local legislator, Haripada Biswas, who belongs to the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist).
Yesterday, Amtec demanded a refund because it did not get possession of the assets for which it paid the 260 million rupees.
Banerjee observed that as the government machinery is obstructing the implementation of his order, the state government should pay the amount to Amtec and recover it by taking possession of the mill’s assets and selling them off. Last month, Banerjee specifically ordered the police superintendent of North 24 Parganas district, deputy inspector general Presidency Range and inspector general South Bengal to assist the court-appointed liquidator to take possession of the assets and hand them to Amtec.
But yesterday, the government counsel informed Banerjee that two additional police superintendents, four deputy police superintendents, nine inspectors, 21 assistant sub-inspectors, 69 constables, two battalions of the Rapid Action Force and 16 policewomen were deployed at the mill on Feb. 23 but workers along with women and children obstructed the huge police force.
The counsel said that many lives would have been lost if the police used force. So the police left the spot without achieving their objective.
After recording the facts, Banerjee directed the government to file an affidavit whether it is in a position to implement the court’s order. “And if the government is not in a position to do so, it must immediately pay Rs26 crore (260 million) to the purchaser directly and take over the mill itself,” Banerjee decreed. “Let this go down in history as a very costly blunder.”
