Yet Another SC Ruling Against Workers

THE Supreme Court has once again come out with a very strange ruling differentiating between legal and illegal strike and justifying punishment of the workers who resort to so-called ‘illegal strike’. The ruling came on February 18, 2004, while allowing an appeal filed by UP State Bridge Corporation Ltd, challenging a verdict of the Allahabad High Court ordering reinstatement of 168 workers whose services were terminated for remaining absent from work for over eight months.

Sukomal Sen, general secretary, All India State Government Employees Federation (AISGEF), in a statement on February 19 expressed dismay at the spate of anti-worker rulings being handed out by the apex court. He said this latest verdict further opens up the scope for offensive against workers because already whenever a strike arises, the managements always hastens to declare it illegal. He pointed out that the court was silent on the government’s or management’s arbitrary decisions of retrenching the workers, downsizing, closure and privatization of the government departments, Boards, semi-government institutions and public sector units. “This is yet another instance how the country’s judiciary is constantly taking position against the working class who are being endlessly harassed by the offensive of IMF-World Bank dictated globalisation”, he said.

The AISGEF called upon the entire working class to stand united against all offensives of the governments, managements and their endorsement by the judiciary.