JOIN US Milk supply in the City will not be affected on Saturday as reported, according to Bangalore Dairy.
Briefing reporters, Ramanagar District Co-operative Milk Producers’ Societies Union Limited (Bangalore Dairy-Bangalore Rural and Urban) president R K Ramesh, and Bangalore Dairy Agents’ Association president H S Rangaswamy said consumers need not worry about milk supply being hit due to a strike call given by a section of the agents, as the association had not given any call for strike.
“We have 1,700-odd members, but only a section of them have called for a strike, which will not affect supply in any way. Other agents will ensure that the supply is not hit,” said Rangaswamy. “We were not even informed about the strike.”
Some of the vendors’ demands cannot be met, which includes demand to nominate one of the agents as director, Bangalore Dairy, “Ours is a body of milk producers and any such nominations should be done by the State government. They should discuss with the government and make an amendment to the bylaws,” he said.
Another demand to get agents the licences, Ramesh said that since the Centre had made licence mandatory for street vendors, they should get it on their own. “We have no role in this,” he said.
He said milk supply being an essential service, strike by agents will amount to violation of law and the dairy will explore the possibilities of initiating action against such vendors.
“Every year, we pay our vendors Rs 75 crore as commission. We pay Rs 1.16 per litre of milk to agents; for selling a litre of curd, we pay a commission of Rs 2 per litre and on our other products, we offer a commission of 15-20 per cent. This strike call is meaningless,” he said.