UCPMA members, vendors meet Police Commissioner

Shivani Bhakoo
Tribune News Service
Ludhiana, October 19

Members of the United Cycle and Parts Manufacturers Association (UCPMA) and vendors from the city, who had supplied material to a Haryana-based bicycle company (Sonipat/Malanpur), met the Police Commissioner and requested him to get an FIR registered against the owners of the bicycle company over pending payments.

UCPMA president Inderjit Singh Navyug said vendors’ business was suffering huge losses without capital. Their liquid was blocked but the company was not releasing the pending payments for the past about three years, Navyug added.

UCPMA advisor Avtar Bhogal said the Police Commissioner had asked them to give 2-3 days’ time to study the case, and then action as per law could be considered.

On being asked that a few vendors were able to get money, Bhogal said about 30 vendors were given cheques by the company. “These post-dated cheques were enough as an important document with few vendors. And if cheques were bounced, it would have been a criminal offense. The company made payments to them, but there are many others left who did not get post-dated cheques from the company, and today they are bearing the brunt as payments are not being given to them,” said Bhogal.

He also condemned the persons, who wanted to get mileage from the incident. “Some industrialists here are claiming that because of their efforts, the company released payments to vendors. This is totally wrong because the vendors had post-dated cheques and they had threatened the company if payments were not made, they would present cheques in the court and the company would be in trouble. On such serious issue too, a few businessmen wanted to grab all the media attention, which is unfortunate,” added Bhogal further mentioning that a few company officials had come to the city for personal function and had invited us for talks.

“We told them to come again for resolving the matter and we are ready for negotiations. But they need to give it a serious thought as for last few months, they are giving us a carrot,” he said.