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OIL's recruitment of 300 unskilled labourers invites threats from students' bodies, political parties

Nitin Gogoi in Guwahati

The Oil India Limited's decision to appoint 300 unskilled workers at one go has put the public sector giant in a dilemma, with several students' organisations and political parties pressurising it to recruit 'their' candidates.

Sources in the OIL admitted that pressure from various students' organisations is mounting, even as the authorities prepare to announce the results of the recruitment drive after screening about 9,000 candidates from three Upper Assam districts of Sivasagar, Dibrugarh and Tinsukia.

With elections just round the corner, some political parties too have joined these pressure groups. These parties are said to be using the students' organisations as fronts to mount pressure on the OIL.

Each of these students' organisations -- including All Assam Students Union, All Assam Moran Students Union and Motok Students Union -- has submitted its list of candidates to the OIL authorities for selection.

For the OIL, the problems have been compounded by the fact that there are no guidelines for recruiting unskilled workers.

The appointment of 300 unskilled workers is a part of the OIL's social commitment package of 1997-98. The ministry of petroleum's blanket ban on appointments last year had almost put paid to largest-ever unskilled workers' recruitment in the oil sector in the region.

However, it was resurrected due to sustained efforts of the OIL as well as various students' organisations including the AASU.

The AASU has been candid in maintaining that since the students' body was instrumental in waiving the ban on appointment of unskilled workers, it wanted OIL to consider the list of candidates it had submitted while filling up the posts.

Similar demands have been raised by other students' organisations. All these students' bodies have threatened to resort to an 'oil blockade' if the OIL failed to consider their demand.

But agitation, demands for financial help have become part of Oil India management's daily chores, often distracting it from its primary task -- that of exploration and extracting oil.

However, the public sector oil enterprise has similar demands hanging over its head perennially, what with the government and the district administration expecting it to foot their bill for non-oil related activities.

P C Goswami, OIL group general manager and resident chief executive, says: "As a responsible public sector company, we are fully aware that we have to help the community around our installations. We will always try to do that, but the expectations from every section of the society is sometimes scary. Take, for example, roads. Our expertise is in exploration and extraction of crude oil and yet, we are expected to spend a heavy amount on making the roads traffic-worthy. Very often we are told that the roads are mostly used by Oil India's vehicles, and hence it is Oil India's duty to maintain them. To an extent, this argument is acceptable, but to expect us to run a parallel welfare-oriented administration is too much."

In the past decade Oil India has spent Rs 136 million on improvement, repair and building of roads in Dibrugarh and Tinsukia. Of this, Rs 42.2 million has been spent in the past three years alone.

Oil India has spent close to Rs 100 million in the past three years on social welfare projects, which include uplift of educational institutions, contribution to socio-cultural organisations, providing drinking water facilities, building bus sheds and helping primary health centres.

With the Assam government claiming that its coffers have depleted alarmingly, Oil India -- which used to contribute 60 per cent of the total cost of a road as against 40 per cent by the state government till a few years ago -- now fully funds roads maintenance costs.

According to one estimate, the company has built at least 400 medium and small bridges in upper Assam. Admittedly, Oil India's drilling sites, most of the time located in remote areas have to be reached and hence the company has to build and maintain roads.

For a company with a turnover of Rs 18.47 billion and a net profit of Rs 4.10 billion in the fiscal 1999-2000, Rs 500 million spent on welfare programmes should not be too heavy a burden.

But top officials of the company are worried about the future rather than the present scenario. Says S N Borah, OIL deputy general manager: "Today, we are operating under the administered prices mechanism and are protected largely against competition. But imagine what would happen 2-3 years down the line when we would not have this protection?"

Borah points out that over the years people and the government have become used to Oil India's monetary assistance. "In the near future, when the pressure of competition increases, we may not be able to spare such huge amounts of cash. That's when the problem could begin," Borah fears.

Others in the company talk about the increasing pressures in other fields. Says a top official: "Despite our best efforts to provide maximum assistance to the community around us, Oil India has been facing rising obstacles in the form of bandhs, road blockades and demonstrations. This affects our productivity."

The figures support what this officer has to say. Between April 1999 to March 2000, Oil India could not produce 18,453 tonnes of crude oil owing to protests and blockades carried out by various organisations. This translates into a loss of over Rs 100 million, at the rate Rs 5,570 a tonne. Such losses have been increasing over the years.

Moreover, the demands for which such protests occur are beyond Oil India's domain. Take, for instance, the demand made by the people of Rohomoria in Dibrugarh district. Oil India struck a new well at Khagorijan in late 1998 and was poised to produce at least 18,000 KL of crude a day from it. Within a couple of months after the actual production began, the people put up a blockade demanding that Oil India take up the construction of a permanent river bank protection embankment against the severe erosion by the Brahmaputra. The total cost of the project: Rs 3.50 billion as estimated by the Assam government's embankment and dykes department.

Oil India has declined to foot the entire bill, and the deadlock is still continuing since August 15, 1999.

Oil India officials admit that the problem of erosion is acute and that the company is equally concerned with the plight of the people. "But to expect us to bear the entire cost is impractical," says Borkakoti, who has been interacting with the administration and the people over the issue almost on a daily basis.

"What people need to understand," says Goswami, "is the necessity of discovering new oil fields and begin extraction immediately. Otherwise, Oil India cannot sustain the current level of production since a majority of our wells are over 30-40 years old. If the people want Oil India to continue supporting their cause, we expect them to let us work in peace."

"By continuing to dole out such large amounts of cash we are buying peace on a short-term basis. However, with the expectations continuing to rise, we may soon be on a dangerous ground."

What Oil India needs, as Goswami puts it, "is a new discovery outside the north-east".

"Today, 90 per cent of our production is in the north-east. The extraneous problems here are tremendous. To prosper as a company, we need to spread our operations."

Till that happens, however, Oil India will have to battle the tendency to treat the company as a milch cow and hope for the best.

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