Brick kilns in the state on the verge of closure , GST , extortion and slow-down in construction responsible

By Our Correspondent

Agartala, August 13, 2022

Rampant extortion by political elements, newly imposed GST and a visible slowdown in construction seem to the sounding the death-knell of the once-booming brick-kiln industry in the state. The situation has come to such a pass that more than three hundred brick kilns , many of them in Jirania area, will be forced to close down business throwing more than seven thousand people out of employment. Sources from Jirania said that over the past four and half years the condition of the brick kiln industries has gone down from bad to worse because of a host of problems. “Earlier during the previous regime we had to contribute to the fund of the political party more or less as per our will and we were also allowed to bargain but every thing has changed over the past four and half years;we are simply over-charged by the elements close to the ruling party and hefty amounts have to be given, there is no other option” said a major brick kiln owner.

To worsen matters , there is an ongoing coal crisis , needed by brick industry, all over the country and in Tripura the crisis is worsened by rampant black-marketing. In the recent past the price of brick had gone up and those building houses privately or under government schemes like the PMAY faced a crisis but a serious slowdown in construction work under government schemes has brought down the price of bricks but still the sale is much less than what it was earlier. There was a time when bricks had to be imported from Bangladesh but now there is hardly any sale and the brick kiln owners who sold bricks to government are running from pillar to post to draw their bills.

The cumulative effect of all this, specially largescale extortion by politicians , have brought the brick kiln industry to a massive crisis . There is every possibility that many kilns will stop production and wind up business, throwing thousands of workers out of employment.