CHENNAI: Electricity Minister CTR Nirmal Kumar on Monday assured fishermen from eight coastal villages around Ennore that the government would frame a permanent and legally sustainable employment policy for eligible families.
Nirmal Kumar held talks with representatives of fishermen’s associations from villages including Nettukuppam and Thazhankuppam at the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board headquarters here, hearing out their demands on employment, livelihood protection, pollution control and other welfare issues.
The minister said officials would study registered fishermen and fishing families in the eight villages before finalising a mechanism that would apply to the present recruitment drive and future appointments as well, to ensure transparency and continuity. He said the government was equally bound to protect contract workers who had served in TNEB for years, and that a fair, legally tenable.
Responding to claims of horse-trading over defections to TVK, the minister said the induction of AIADMK and DMK members into the party could not be termed horse-trading, claiming several AIADMK members were joining TVK out of dissatisfaction with the AIADMK-DMK proximity. TVK did not invite any one to join, , adding that former minister Senthil Balaji was the one who had engaged in horse-trading.