JMM members argue with the labour superintendent at Sitaramdera on Wednesday. (Bhola Prasad)

Jamshedpur, May 5: Accusing the East Singhbhum district labour superintendent, Kameswar Ram, of demanding bribe for issuing labour licences to transporters, JMM workers today gheraoed the former at his Sitaramdera office.

The protesters, led by its town committee president Shyamal Sarkar, said that Ram’s assistant Mantra Narayan Thakur was also a party to the malpractices.

“The superintendent and his assistant are openly demanding money — anything between Rs 1,000 and Rs 10,000 — against each licence. Those who are unable to meet the demands are being harassed,” Sarkar said.

“There are over 20,000 trucks, trailers, buses and other commercial vehicles in Jamshedpur, and on an average, each vehicle has at least three labourers,” he added.

He threatened that the JMM would launch a massive agitation if the labour superintendent did not mend his ways.

The agitation that began at 11am was lifted an hour later after deputy labour commissioner Ram Pravesh Singh intervened and promised to look into the matter personally.

He also assured the agitators that no transporter would be harassed.

An angry Sarkar left the premises but not before warning that the JMM would block the entire city with commercial vehicles — trailers, trucks, mini-buses and other mode of transport — if the party’s town committee received any further complaint of bribery.

A notification issued on April 6, 2010, by transport commissioner Nitin Madan Kulkarni stated that transporters would be issued transport permits if only they had the necessary labour licence under the Motor Transport Workers Act, 1961.

He had also said that the transporters ought to obtain the necessary licences within a month of issuance of the notification.

The notice reached Jamshedpur on April 21, 2010, and circulated among transporters. They started flocking to the labour office to obtain the licence, but many came back complaining that the superintendent had asked money from them.

However, Ram denied the allegations.

“There is a set procedure for issuing labour licences. When transporters are not able to fulfil the given criteria, they cry foul and go to political party offices to make false allegations,” he told The Telegraph.

“These are baseless allegations. We have to work according to a fixed pattern and given guidelines. For getting a license, one has to furnish ownership papers of the particular vehicle, number of workers engaged by him, the period from which the vehicle is on the road and so on. But most transporters fail to produce the necessary papers,” said Ram.

He further claimed that till now, he had already issued licences to more than 12 transporters.