Veteran Trade Union Leader Bishnu Mohanty Passes Away At 74

Bhubaneswar: Veteran trade union leader and All India Vice President of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), Bishnu Mohanty, passed away early Saturday morning while undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Bhubaneswar. He was 74.

According to hospital sources, Mohanty breathed his last at around 3:15 am. He had been suffering from diabetes-related complications and was under medical treatment for some time.

A towering figure in Odisha’s labour movement, Mohanty began his political journey as a student activist and was associated with the Students’ Federation of India (SFI). During his student years, he was elected three times as president of the student union of Rourkela Government College and also served three terms as president of the student union of Rourkela Law College.

A prominent student leader from Sundargarh district, Mohanty was arrested and spent 24 months in jail during the Emergency in 1975. He also played a major role in several movements, including the Talcher-Bimlagarh railway agitation and the contract workers’ movement in Rourkela, which led to further imprisonment.

Mohanty later became a senior member of the CPI(M) state secretariat and served as the General Secretary of CITU in Odisha as well as its National Vice President. Over the years, he led several trade unions across Sundargarh and other parts of the state, serving as president and general secretary of multiple organisations.

From 2000 until his demise, he continuously served as the Odisha State General Secretary of CITU for 26 years, emerging as one of the strongest voices of the labour movement in the state.

His death has been widely mourned across political and trade union circles, with leaders and workers describing it as an irreparable loss to the working-class movement in Odisha and the country.