People's Democracy

CITU WORKING COMMITTEE CALL

Strengthen Working Class Unity; 
Bring Masses into Struggles

Hemalata

THE working committee of the CITU called upon the working class to intensify the struggles against the attacks on the living and working conditions of the toiling masses in the country. Noting the complicated political situation in the country, the report adopted by the working committee observed ‘The present political reality is that the communal and divisive forces that have been ousted from power at the centre are eagerly waiting in the wings, greedily looking for the earliest opportunity to stage a come back. The working class keenly desires that the UPA government should take measures, which would frustrate these attempts. But, the working class and the trade union movement cannot remain silent onlookers to such actions of the government, which negate the people’s verdict and cause serious discontent among them. Under these circumstances, resistance to the anti-people and anti-worker measures of the UPA government, which are more in tune with the retrograde policies of economic liberalisation has to mature from protest actions to more and more strong, united and sustained struggles of the working class.’

The working committee met at Rabindra Bhawan in Agartala, the capital city of Tripura on December 3-5, 2004. This was the first time that an all India meeting of CITU was held in the landlocked North Eastern state which has been long neglected by the successive governments at the centre. Around 100 members of the working committee from all over the country participated in the meeting, which looked at the international and national situation from the working class view point, discussed the implementation of the decisions of the Nasik general council held in July 2004, and formulated the future activities.

The meeting began at 10.00 am on December 3, with the hoisting of the Red Flag of CITU by its president, M K Pandhe, and paying floral homage to the martyrs who laid down their lives in the struggle to protect the interests of the toiling masses. This was followed by the inaugural session in which the chairman of the reception committee, Khagen Das, MP, welcomed the delegates. He informed the working committee members that with its rich natural resources like gas, rubber, tea, pine apple etc Tripura had immense potential for development, but these could not be tapped due to the lack of infrastructure, which has been neglected by the Government of India. He pointed out that the root cause of insurgency in the state was unemployment and poverty, which was being utilised by the anti-national elements. The Left Front, which has been ruling the state for twenty one years, in two spells, has been trying its best to improve the living conditions of the people and has been successful in protecting the unity of the tribal and non-tribal population of the state. There has been significant improvement in the social indicators in the state, like literacy, education and health during the tenure of the Left Front government.

UNSUSTAINABLE NEO-LIBERAL ORDER

M K Pandhe delivered the presidential address which dealt at length on the international situation. He referred to the increasing aggressiveness of American imperialism, particularly after the re-election of Bush for the second term as president. Pandhe noted that the recent developments in world economy showed some signs of partial recovery of capitalism, but the economy in the developed countries was slower than the world average. The spectacular rate of growth of the Chinese economy significantly contributed to the higher rate of growth of the world economy as a whole and that of the developing countries. He observed that the international trade under the regime of globalisation has not helped the developing countries anywhere in the world, which was evident even from the data trotted out by the World Bank. The number of poor in the world has gone up. While 25 years ago 500 million people in the world were starving, the figure has swelled to 800 million today. Around 325 million children in the world have no chance of going to school and most of them are forced to work. As per the WHO figures, 33,000 children die everyday in developing countries due to curable diseases, while the prices of essential medicines are hiked by the profit-hungry pharmaceutical MNCs.

Quoting the message of Fidel Castro to the UNCTAD conference, Pandhe concluded, ‘The imperialist system that prevails today, towards which the developed capitalist society unavoidably evolved, has already come to such a ruthlessly irrational and unfair world economic and neo-liberal order that it is unsustainable. Many people will rebel against it. In fact, they have already begun to rebel. For the first time in the history, man has created the technical capacity for its own destruction. However, it has not been capable of creating a minimum guarantee for the safety and integrity of every country on equal footing… The people will become ungovernable, and no repression, torture, disappearances or massive murders will stop them. Not only will the hungry of the Third World be in the struggle for their own survival and that of their children, but also the conscious people from the rich world, both manual and intellectual workers.’

Shyamal Chakravarty, secretary of CITU introduced a resolution congratulating the working class and the people of Tripura for preserving the unity of the tribal and non-tribal people in the state and for their role in the struggle against the anti-worker policies of the central government. The resolution also greeted the Left Front government of Tripura, which was doing a commendable job to uplift the living conditions of the people in the state while resisting the pressure from the successive governments at the centre to implement the anti-people policies of globalisation. K N Ravindranath seconded the resolution. The meeting also unanimously passed a resolution introduced by E Balanandan, vice president of CITU and supported by Habeeb, secretary, demanding that the Electricity Bill 2003 should be reviewed and the harmful clauses withdrawn.

NEGATIVE SWING IN POLICIES

Chittabrata Majumdar presented the general secretary’s report, which outlined the national situation under the UPA rule. He explained that the CMP formulated by the UPA government maintained the main paradigm of the economic policies pursued since 1991, but had to incorporate some positive pro-peasant, pro-worker and pro-poor promises due to the pressure from the Left forces. At the same time, the government was trying to implement the Fund-Bank dictated policies of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation through the back door, by utilising some cleverly worded assertions in the CMP. While there was no initiative to implement the pro-people promises, the government was all too keen to oblige the national and multinational corporations. The recent decisions of the government to hike the FDI cap in civil aviation from 40 to 49 per cent, its repeated assertions to privatise the lucrative Delhi and Mumbai airports, the non-serious attitude in formulating the revival plans for the sick PSUs, the decision of the Group of Ministers to sell the equities in the profitable PSUs through IPO etc were all indications of the negative swing in the policies.

The report made it clear that what has changed with the change in regime at the centre was that the CMP has only given some space for the trade union movement to move forward and intensify the struggle. The general secretary’s report warned that the working class has to be vigilant and alert towards the policies of the government and should mobilise the workers and other sections of the society to bring pressure on the government at least to implement the pro-worker and pro-people promises made in the CMP. The struggle against ‘religious fundamentalism’ and ‘market fanaticism’ should be fought with equal vigour. The trade union movement must prepare itself for a long drawn united struggle and there should not be any illusion that the advocates of the so-called ‘economic reforms’ will lose their zeal because the government has to depend on the support of the Left Parties in the parliament.

EXPERIENCES

A total of 29 members participated in the discussion on the general secretary’s report, after which it was unanimously adopted. While supporting the report they strengthened it by narrating their own experiences in the states. Member after member reported about the increasing repression and police intervention in the struggles of the working class to protect their existing rights. The incidences in Visakhapatnam Port Trust, in the New Allen Berry Factory in Faridabad, in the glass bangle industry in Ferozabad in Uttar Pradesh were only a few examples. In Banihal in Jammu and Kashmir, where the construction workers in the Udhampur – Baramulla Railway Project were on strike since the last four months, the Army was deployed at the instance of the contractor, to terrorise the workers. In many states, unions were not even being registered under the Trade Unions Act. Workers and their leaders were being victimised in a big way for joining unions. Workers had to launch prolonged struggles even for the implementation of such basic rights like 8 hours work, attendance register, appointment letter, minimum wages and the right to form unions.

The working committee noted with grave concern the increasing contractorisation and casualisation of the work place and observed that neglecting the most important task of organising the contract workers would be suicidal for the entire trade union movement. The regular workers’ unions must take the responsibility of organising the contract workers. It emphasised that drawing appropriate strategy, both at the work place as well as at the national level, was necessary to voice forcefully the demands of the contract workers. It was decided to hold conventions at the all India, state and industry level to bring the problems of the contract workers into focus. The working committee also decided to undertake a deeper study of the Information Technology (IT) and Information Technology Enabled Services (ITES) and adopt an appropriate strategy to organise the workers in this sector, which has started playing a crucial role in the country’s economy.

The working committee criticised the Draft Bill for the Unorganised Sector workers of the UPA government, which envisaged social security for the unorganised sector workers based on their contributions with just a token contribution from the central government. The bill seeks to impose a heavy burden on the state governments, which raises doubts on whether the bill can ever take off in its present form. Similarly the bill on Rural Employment Guarantee also suffers from many anomalies. The CITU working committee called upon all the CITU units to undertake a vigorous campaign among the workers at the grass root level and make efforts to develop a countrywide movement focusing the demands of CITU on these issues.

The working committee also endorsed the recommendations of the national workshop of the All India Coordination Committee of Working Women (AICCWW) held on November 18-19, which included continuing the signature campaign and submission of memoranda to the governors in all states on 8th March 2005; making serious efforts to organise the home-based workers, domestic workers and fishers and fisheries workers, develop an all India movement of nurses and collect all the available data on the participation of working women in the trade union movement in the last 25 years. It was noted that the mobilisation in the convention and the rally reflected the functioning of the state-level coordination committees of working women as well as the attention paid by the CITU state committees to the work among working women. 

The CITU working committee noted that the rising unemployment is of serious concern not only to the working class but also the millions of youth who were entering the job market every year. Even internationally, as a result of the ‘jobless growth’ due to the globalisation policies, unemployment was increasing and the issue was becoming a focal point in the political developments also. Hence, it was imperative on the part of the CITU to take up the issue with due seriousness and it was decided to start the efforts by organising a two day workshop in March – May, 2005.

Emphasising the importance of united struggles the working committee observed that unless the unity of the working class is strengthened, the task of bringing broader masses, besides the working class, into struggles cannot be effective. This envisages streng-thening the CITU, expanding its independent activities and taking a dominant role in building struggles which would help the working class and the trade unions to overcome vacillations and join the struggles in order to strengthen them in proper directions.

MASSIVE RALLY

Manik Sarkar, chief minister of Tripura greeted the working committee on the evening of December 4. He mentioned about the frontline role of CITU and the working class movement in Tripura in combating the onslaughts of the extremist forces while carrying on united struggle against the neo-liberal policies and in defence of the democratic rights. The role of the working class movement and the CITU in particular had always been crucial in shaping and elevating the democratic movement in the state to its present height, asserted Manik Sarkar.  Several cultural troupes in the state presented brilliant performances, including tribal songs and dances. All the working committee members who attended the meeting gained first hand knowledge on the difficult conditions in which the activists of the CITU and other mass organisations were working and were inspired by their hard work. The last day witnessed a massive rally of workers in the Astabal Maidan, who marched in small streams from different corners of the city to converge to the venue. The public meeting was addressed by Manik Sarkar, M K Pandhe, Chittabrata Majumdar and Pijush Nag, general secretary of the Tripura state committee of CITU.