Assuring Bengal’s showcase IT sector that there will be ‘‘no repeat’’ of the September 29 industrial strike, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today put himself on a collision course with CITU, the CPM’s labour arm, promising to arrest cadres who had prevented IT workers from reaching workplaces on strike day. Senior officials of foreign and Indian companies, who met Bhattacharjee at his office to discuss strike-day disruption, were assured by the CM that there would be no repeat of such incidents. ‘‘Give me names of those who blocked your vehicles and I will have them arrested,’’ he told top officials of PriceWaterhouse Coopers, HSBC, Cognizant Technology Solutions, TCS, Wipro and others. Sources said a senior executive asked Bhattachajee what was he supposed to do if he was stopped on his way to work. The CM, who also handles the police department, replied: ‘‘Dial 100 and the police will come to your rescue.’’ During the strike called by Left unions, the IT sector took a hit when CITU cadres, trying to enforce a bandh, stopped vehicles ferrying staff to call centres and other workplaces. Even government stickers, granting them right of way as an essential service, were ripped off. ‘‘I am very sorry for what has happened,’’ Bhattacharjee was quoted as having said the moment he entered the room. Emerging from the meeting, IT officials said the CM was ‘‘very apologetic’’ and ‘‘concerned’’. Bhattacharjee told them he was going to New Delhi on October 24 for a CPM politburo meeting and would take up the issue with his party. When an IT chief told Bhattacharjee that people from a CPM office next to Cognizant’s facility had blocked vehicles, the CM looked surprised and turned to his IT minister. ‘‘It is not a party office, it is a CITU office,’’ the minister clarified. Bhattacharjee shot back: ‘‘Why are you trying to differentiate between the party and CITU? It is the same thing.’’ Those present at the meeting were Roopen Roy of PriceWaterhouseCoopers, P Mukherjee of IBM, Siddhartha Mukherjee of Cognizant Technology Solutions, Indu Khattar of Wipro Technologies, Stewart J Pugh of HSBC, Ajoyendra Mukherjee of TCS, Bikram Dasgupta of BITES, and VVR Babu and Shouvik Mukherjee from The Indus Entrepreneurs. Outside, the CITU continued to be unapologetic. CITU general secretary Chittabrata Majumdar said: ‘‘Let me tell you, every worker has the the right to strike.’’ What the CITU leader did not say was that the IT sector at Salt Lake has no union member and would have functioned normally had cadres not blocked transport.
