Chennai jewellers join seven-day stir

CHENNAI: The Finance Ministry has invited representatives of the jewellery trade from every State for a meeting in New Delhi on Friday, to discuss the sector’s persistent and vociferous demand for a rollback of customs duty announced by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in the Union Budget. The call to State-level bodies came even as jewellers across Tamil Nadu and most parts of Chennai started their third strike in as many weeks.The All India Gems and Jewellery Trade Federation (AIGJTF) had called a seven-day bandh starting Wednesday. But squabbles between some of the members meant the shutdown was not complete across Chennai. Jewellers on T Nagar’s Usman Road, who see the highest ornamental gold movement in the world, continued to do business. The AIGJWF has reportedly now revised its bandh call to a five-day bandh from Thursday, in a bid to accommodate the truant T Nagar giants.“A number of association across the country have started an indefinite bandh. A seven-day bandh has been called across Tamil Nadu, and it has been absolute, except from some stores in T Nagar,” said N Anantha Padmanabhan, regional chairman of the AIGJTF.He added that the sector was hopeful of a positive outcome ahead of Friday’s meeting with Finance Ministry officials. “We hope it will be positive; otherwise the indefinite strike will continue across the country,” he added.A day after the Union Budget was delivered in Parliament on March 16, jewellers across the country had gone on a three-day strike to protest new taxes and excise duty proposed to be levied. While several parts of the country have continued to remain on strike since then, jewellers in Tamil Nadu went on strike once again in the last week of March.