Kolkata: The government has assured Coal India union leaders that the company would remain dominant even after private commercial mining begins, but workers have decided to go ahead with the April 16 strike.

“We had a round of talks with the unions and told them that Coal India will remain a dominant public sector player in the Indian coal scene and it would also offer an opportunity to employees to get absorbed in other private companies after retirement in case they want to opt for it,” Coal India chairman Gopal Singh said.

Union leaders, who held talks in Delhi last week, do not want private competition.

“Although, at the meeting, the government assured that it will not allow Coal India to be affected negatively when commercial mining starts, the assurance could not convince the union leaders who met coal secretary and the coal minister Piyush Goyal last week,” said DD Ramanandan, general secretary of All India Coal Workers Federation (AICWF), affiliated to CITU.

INTUC, which had so far kept away, has also joined the strike called by CITU, BMS, HMS and AITUC. These five represent almost the entire workforce of the company.

“We feel, allowing private commercial mining would affect the interests of coal workers who would be paid a fraction of what CIL employees receive just like in the pre-nationalisation era,” Ramanandan said.