Meanwhile, officials working at the Tata plant fear that hundreds of daily labourers might flee the site and that would slowdown the work and would pose a serious problem. Apart from a sustained agitation, the TMC-led panchayat samiti is likely to stop giving out licenses to the ancillary units, which would further create problems for the functioning of the plant. According to officials at the plant, the company may bring in components from outside, if the ancillary plant is not ready within the given time frame.

On July 29, members of the Singur Krishi Jami Raksha Committee beat up an engineer of the construction agency. Violence and intimidation also drove out a number of workers from the plant site.

“Two weeks back only 40 per cent of the workers were available at the plant, following disturbances. Last week, the attendance jumped to 65 per cent. We are holding regular meetings to review the security situation,” said Prasenjit Chattopadhyay, BDO of Singur and a member of the state Government’s monitoring team.

The local CPI(M) leaders, backing the project, are hopeful that Nano will meet its deadline, but are not so sure whether the entire project will be ready by October. “Tata’s mother plant will be ready, considering the current pace of work, but the entire project may not meet the deadline. The ancillary units are yet to pick up,” said Dibakar Das, district CPI(M) leader.

“According to Tata Motors’ report, submitted to us last week, 75 per cent of the work is over. With the current pace they are expected to meet the October deadline, provided there is no disruptions inside the plant. But there are problems pertaining to the ancillary units. Out of the 35 which were given licences, 17 are in various stages of construction. We do not expect them to start operating on time and be ready for the October-November deadline,” said the BDO. “The work for engine shop, paint shop is complete. There are six big shades which are also complete,” he added.

... contd.