Handloom, beedi workers narrate woes to Dattatreya

Seek removal of pictorial warning on beedi packs

Sircilla (Karimnagar): Union Minister of State for Labour Bandaru Dattatreya visited Sircilla town on Tuesday and received several representations from the trade union leaders.

In a memorandum submitted to the Union Minister, handloom weavers said that more than 20,000 workers in the handloom sector were facing immense hardships as the handloom industry was in a deep crisis.

They said that the workers neither had job security nor social security and the managements were behaving in a highly irresponsible manner with them.

The trade union leaders said that the beedi workers were also suffering in the district as several restrictions were imposed on the production and smoking of beedis.

The sales of beedis declined sharply as warning messages with the image of skull were printed on the beedi packets, they said. They demanded removal of the image of skull on beedi packets.