Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee being felicitated at the coordination committee meeting. Telegraph picture

Siliguri, Dec. 30: Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today removed a thorn in his relationship with over 2.5 lakh coordination committee members by announcing that the government might bring back the rule ensuring jobs for relatives of employees who die in harness.

“The recent circular on dying in harness has not been welcomed by many. We will have to revert to what the rules were earlier,” the chief minister said amid applause at the 15th state conference of the CPM government employees’ union here.

According to the circular, immediate relatives of those who die while serving in a state department would have to request the government for a job. A committee would examine the family’s income and decide whether or not a job could be given.

Earlier, an immediate relative of any government employee who died in harness after serving for six months was eligible for a job.

The rule did not apply if the dead employee had only two years or less left for retirement, said the Jalpaiguri secretary of the co-ordination committee, Narayan Mazumdar.

The chief minister said that talks were on with the labour and finance departments to finalise the decision to go back to the old policy.

“We are all members of one big family. For the last 30 years, you have seen us sharing our joys and sorrows with you. We’ve always been open with you and will keep it that way,” he told about 3,000 union representatives.

During his 52-minute speech, Bhattacharjee touched on several issues raised in a report prepared by the union, including the “huge uncertainty in Pakistan” after Benazir Bhutto’s death.

The recent National Deve-lopment Council meeting in Delhi “witnessed a lot of debate” unlike previous ones, the chief minister said. “We challenged the projected increase in annual growth rate from 9 to 11 per cent on the grounds that jobs in the public and private sectors had actually decreased by 4 per cent, and that this growth would be benefiting mainly the few billionaires in the country.”

Regretting the government’s “failures” in Nandigram, Bhattacharjee iterated that his government “would not let go of opportunities to build manufacturing industries”.

“Our main lookout is jobs for the thousands of youths graduating from various colleges. If not Nandigram, Nayachar,” he said.

The government is planning a chemical hub on the island after the Nandigram plan was scrapped.