It is evening time in Bhagirathpur village of Samastipur district of Bihar. Naushad Alam, 53, leader of the Rameshwar Jute Mill Mazdoor Union, sits straight on an old brown plastic chair on his verandah. The birds chirp in chorus, but his gravelly voice keeps the chirping in check: “About 15 to 20 years ago, about 5,000 workers were on the mill’s payroll; now only 1,200 remain. Work shifts gradually decreased from three to two, and workers were gradually laid off year after year.”
Rameshwar Jute Mill was temporarily closed in November 2025, ending the company’s 100-year-old legacy. Now, workers are fighting for pending dues, a wage hike once the mill reopens and union elections.
Over the past few decades, due to the rise of plastic packaging, low jute supply and obsolete production processes, the demand for jute bags has been declining. According to the Agriculture Ministry’s Annual Report 2024, jute production has declined from 106 lakh bales in 2014 to 84 lakh bales in 2024.
Mr Alam claims that the immediate cause of the mill’s closure was corruption: a mill manager who “ran away with crores worth of raw jute” and the owner, Winsome International, which did not repay a loan of ₹24 crore. Mr Alam says others, who have started a parallel, unregistered union, have controlled the Rameshwar Jute Mill Mazdoor Union, have not held elections for at least 4 years, and are in collusion with the management.
Decline in employment and wages
Mr. Alam has some visitors, and he asks them to wait on the veranda. His phone rings, and he looks at the gate number of the mill. 3, is clearly visible from his verandah. “A case of non-payment of dues to Winsome International by Bihar State Food and Civil Supplies Corporation Limited is pending in the Patna High Court,” he says.
About 500 meters away from gate no. 3 is closed gate number. 1. There is a notice pasted on it by Rameshwar Jute Mill Sangharsh Samiti, an unregistered union formed in 2003. Dated March 1, 2026, it demands immediate reopening of the mill, payment of revised wages to workers, immediate processing of provident fund dues, implementation. summon furnace (Honorarium Allowance), and some other demands. It has the signature of Chairman Rambali Mahato.
Union members led by Rambali Mahato (wearing red shirt) protested outside the jute mill. Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Mr Alam and 1,200 employees of the jute mill are part of the Rameshwar Jute Mill Mazdoor Sangh. They want the government to provide an alternative source of employment to mill workers, so that skilled workers are not left in unskilled jobs and are not forced to migrate to urban centers like Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad for casual work at construction sites.
Mr Alam says, “We have been demanding a daily wage of ₹660 for the last 5 years. This is also mandated by the Bihar government, but the demands fell on deaf ears.” In October 2025, the Bihar government implemented the Pay Code, Rules 2025. The new rates fix the minimum daily wage at ₹660 for high-skilled workers, ₹444 for semi-skilled and ₹428 for unskilled workers. Jute mill workers claim that they fall in the category of highly skilled workers.
status of jute
Rameshwar Jute Mills was established by Darbhanga Maharaja Rameshwar Singh in 1926 on 84 acres of land. In 1954, the mill was taken over by Birla Gwalior Limited, which managed and operated it until 1976. Birla sold the jute mill in 1986 to Kolkata-based company Winsome International Limited, which also owned a jute mill in Kolkata.
The Government of India has mandated the use of jute bags for packaging under the Jute Packaging Materials (JPM) Act, 1987, with the aim of supporting domestic farmers and eco-friendly practices. By 2024-25, up to 100% of food grains and 20% of sugar products should be packed in jute bags. This rule applies to Food Corporation of India, State Food Corporations (like BSFCSCL) and sugar mills. According to the government, it supports 4 lakh jute mill workers and several lakh jute farmers from West Bengal, Odisha, Tripura, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar.
As of 2014, the daily output of Rameshwar Jute Mill was 80 tonnes of bags per day, says Alam, and while its capacity remained the same, production was only about half that. It supplied jute bags to BSFCSCL and state food grain procurement corporations of Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Punjab.
According to the India Jute Mills Association, there are 3.7 to 4 lakh jute mill workers in 80 to 120 mixed jute mills in India, most of which are concentrated in West Bengal. Composite jute mills are those that can perform all the manufacturing processes of the production cycle. There are three or four in Purnia region of Bihar. According to the Economic Survey 2024-2025, Bihar produced 8.5 lakh jute bales in 2024 and has a share of 9.62% in India’s total production.
India is the largest producer of jute in the world, accounting for 70% of global production; 90% of the produce is used domestically. America is the largest destination for India’s jute products.
mill village
Bhagirathi village, as the villagers call it informally, is clustered around a jute mill behind the Muktapur railway station in Samastipur. Its population is around 10,000 and till a few years ago almost all the families here were dependent on the mill for their livelihood.
This village is situated on the banks of Budhi Gandak river, a tributary of Ganga. A narrow sand dune separates the village from the river. The road leading to the mill from Muktapur station is equally narrow. The three gates of the mill open on three different sides of the village. At the edge of the village are deserted colonial-era residential quarters, which once housed mill officials. The green and blue arches and large airy windows are covered with moss and dust, and the grass has spread from the lawn to brownRusted balconies. The quiet, lazy evenings of the village bear the burden of unemployment.
Suresh Paswan, an 80-year-old retired mill worker, sells samosa-jalebi every day in his roadside shop. outpost (Bed). He keeps his breakfast on a red tarpaulin, while a green tarpaulin supported on bamboo sticks provides shade. wearing thin maroon Banyan and a blue-silver lungi, he is sitting on outpost Wearing a silver and maroon HMT watch on his wrist, he was listening intently to his customers.
“When the mill was in full operation I worked two shifts a day. I was on the line Mechanic (Mechanic) for the weaving machine,” Paswan says, glancing quickly at the two waiting customers. “I retired 15 years ago. I received a monthly pension of ₹7,000, which was enough for a good life for my family in the village. The mill remained closed for two years from 2017 to 2019. I stopped getting pension. I owe the mill more than ₹5 lakh. Now this shop is my only source of income.”
Former mill employee Suresh Paswan is selling snacks in his roadside shop. | Photo courtesy: The Hindu
Mr. Alam says that more than 500 workers have lodged a complaint about non-payment of their pension at the Provident Fund Commissioner’s office located in Muzaffarpur, about 50 kilometers away. “They have assured us that our dues will be cleared once the mill reopens. We have also filed a case with the District Labor Commissioner in Darbhanga.” No government official responded The HinduQuestions of.
pushed into other employment
300 meters from Mr Alam’s house, Gopal Das, 55, chats with two friends on the platform of a local temple. “I used to work regularly in the mill till 2017. Our main dispute with the mill management was over wages. They used to give us ₹400 per day, while we were demanding ₹660, which was the standard rate in jute mills of West Bengal,” he says, adding that he had gone to Kolkata to find a permanent job in a mill, but the work was irregular.
“I worked as a plumber in Kolkata for a few years to support my family, but I had to come back during the COVID-19 lockdown.” He says he has since started doing casual work under the government’s Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. “Sometimes there is food on our plate; sometimes not.” He says the mill owes him more than ₹2 lakh in pension, gratuity and unpaid wages.
Mr Alam says some jute mill workers have re-trained themselves as painters and plumbers to prepare themselves for urban jobs. “Some people have found work in jute mills in West Bengal, but mills are closing there too, so there is reverse migration from urban centers to villages,” says Mr Alam. When the mill opened, most of the villagers moved from the surrounding areas, so they do not have much agricultural land.
He takes a sip of tea and adds, “We contacted local JD(U) MLA Maheshwar Hazari with our complaints and problems. He raised the issue of salaries and closure of Rameshwar Jute Mill in the Bihar Assembly on February 22, 2026. We also contacted LJP’s Samastipur MP Shambhavi Chaudhary, but he did not pay attention to us.”
The fight between representation and welfare
Dinesh, aged 50, was a former colleague of Mr Das and is with him at the temple. Taking out a green tobacco pouch from his pants, he laments, “We were tired of the indifference of the mill owner and management. The building is in a dilapidated condition inside and the equipment is broken. I was once working on the line and a big cement slab fell in front of me. There was once a night guard who died when the slab fell on his head.”
He remembers the mill manager “Prithviraj ji”, who was appointed in the 1990s, and who got the management to “implement dearness allowance” for the workers. “He sewed us new blue uniforms and provided better working conditions. He was shot on the platform of this temple.”
He worked as a beamer in the mill, placing hundreds of jute threads into a giant roll, called a beam, which was then placed on a loom for weaving. He explains about the wage system of the mill. “Till November 2025, when the mill was closed, workers were hired at three wages: ₹410, ₹423, and ₹430. Tenure and experience determined which wage workers would be paid.”
He says that on March 1, 2026, labor leader Rambali Mahato had called a meeting of workers to discuss low wages. “We agreed that we will not start work unless the mill pays us the minimum wage of ₹66.”
sound of Silence
Mahato is a farmer, a local producer of cement slabs used to cover potholes, and a labor leader. He founded the Rameshwar Jute Mill Sangharsh Samiti with the support of more than 1,500 former workers of the mill.
He is standing at a grocery store outside his house, and is greeted by various people passing by. As the sun sets silently in the background, flies begin to buzz around her red towel (cotton cloth). Mahato They say,“My father was a jute mill worker. One day a mill official humiliated him on the mill floor because of his caste. Then I decided to work for the mill workers. There was a fight from Re to Aap, we have brought it from Re to Aap.” (They respect us now and call us AAP instead of again). “We will fight until they agree on a wage of ₹660.“ Mr Mahato says the quality of jute has also deteriorated over the years, so even a regular 8-hour shift is extra tiring for the workers.
Mr Mahato’s neighbour, Sunita Devi, 45, is harvesting green fodder through a manual fodder cutter, while two children play around her, and two cows wait for their meal. “Life was better when my husband worked in the mill,” she says. “He earned about ₹20,000 a month. This pucca house was built with his earnings. But when the mill closed in 2017, he quit the job. The mill still has not paid his wages and PF.” She says she is in Kolkata looking for work. “The children miss him. If he finds work in the mill he will start living with us again.” The siren that used to ring three times a day to signal shift change has been silenced. The only sound that echoes in the village is the temple bell.
