All-party meet requests Centre to keep HNL in public sector

An all party meeting chaired by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan today requested the Centre to desist from the move to privatise state based Hindustan Newsprint Ltd near Kochi and keep it in the public sector.

The meeting decided that government would put pressure on the Centre to keep the company in the public sector and to explore the possibility of taking legal steps in this regard, an official release said.

It was also decided to conduct a detailed study to examine the possibility of state taking over the company, the release said.

The meeting pointed out that the Kerala assembly in 2017 had unanimously passed a resolution against any move to privatise HNL.

Ministers A C Moideen, T P Ramakrishnan and Ramachandran Kadanapally, Kerala Congress(M) leader K M Mani and Congress leaders K C Joseph and R Chandrasekhar were among those who attended the meet.