People's Democracy

43^RD SESSION OF THE STANDING LABOUR COMMITTEE

�Labour Issues are of No Concern to the Labour Ministry�

Hemalata

THE 43^rd session of the standing labour committee was held on 30 October 2009, at a time when the workers in the country were facing increasing attacks on their livelihood and living conditions. More than 25 lakh workers in India lost their jobs due to the global economic crisis, the prices of all essential commodities continue to rise and the attacks on the working class were increasing. But these concerns of the workers were not at all reflected in the report placed by the Labour ministry in the session.

The agenda for the standing labour committee was the action taken report by the ministry of Labour on the conclusions of the last Indian Labour Conference and to fix the agenda for the 43^rd session of the Indian Labour Conference scheduled in February 2010. Mallikarjun Kharge, union minister for labour and employment presided over the session, which was also attended by Harish Rawat, the minister of state for labour and employment.

The CITU was represented in the session by M K Pandhe, president, Mohammed Amin, general secretary of CITU as delegates and Hemalata, secretary, CITU and Vijay Mishra, president of the Punjab state committee of CITU as advisors.

Participating in the discussions, M K Pandhe made a scathing attack on the functioning of the labour ministry, for its utter neglect of the interests of labour and ignoring tripartism.

Pandhe pointed out that the meeting itself, where no minister was present from the different government departments that employed large number of workers, like steel, coal, textiles, women and child development etc, reflected the decline in tripartism. The SLC has been reduced to a forum for only fixing the agenda for the Indian Labour Conference, which too has become just a debating society where issues were debated but no decision is taken. The Indian Labour Conference had a history of deciding the norms for fixing the minimum wages, of deciding the labour code etc. But, in the last 20 years, no single decision of long term value has been taken by the Indian Labour Conference.

Castigating the government for taking no action on the conclusions of the last session of the Indian Labour Conference, Pandhe said that while the last session of the ILC concluded that the government should ensure that labour laws were strictly implemented, the ATR mentions that the government has issued a circular to the state governments. He asked whether issuing circulars, which could be drafted by any junior officer and passing the buck on to state governments, could be considered action taken and questioned the need for any discussion on the action taken report, when in fact no action was taken.

According to the law, any factory employing more than 100 workers has to take the permission of the government for closing down. In the last one year, hundreds of factories have closed down rendering thousands of workers jobless. However, no factory has taken permission. No action has been taken against any one of these managements.

Last Indian Labour Conference concluded that a broad based social security scheme including unemployment allowance for the unorganised workers needed to be formulated. What was the action that was purportedly taken by the government? The report simply listed out several schemes that have been in existence even before the last Indian Labour Conference, like the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana, Aam Admi Bima Yojana, and Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension scheme etc.

Referring to the job losses due to the global economic crisis, Pandhe said that the government survey itself said that five lakh workers have lost their jobs. The ILC concluded that unemployment insurance should be provided to the workers and that employment guarantee scheme should be extended to the urban areas. The government has provided crores of rupees worth bail out packages to the employers but no relief has been given to the workers. Actually, the number of workers who have lost jobs is more than 25 lakhs. The Gujarat chief minister himself told that around 70 workers in the diamond cutting industry in the state have committed suicides. But the government report has no mention of any relief for the workers. It was the commitment of the UPA I government to provide jobs for 100 days in a year to the rural, urban poor and middle class families. But that commitment was not honoured. The labour ministry did not take any initiative to extend the employment guarantee act to the urban areas.

Another conclusion of the last Indian Labour Conference was that the scope of the public distribution system should be widened. In practice however, it is being diluted. The quantity of food grains supplied to the states under public distribution system is being reduced.

Pandhe said that the ministry seemed to be totally unconcerned about the developments going on in the country. The last agreement with the workers in the public sector units in the country has expired on 1 January 2007. But no step has been taken by the labour ministry to start the negotiations. As a result, wage negotiations in all the 200 public sector units have been held up. This aspect was not even mentioned in the speeches of either the labour minister of the minister of state for labour.

The government and the employers group, in their speeches, proudly mentioned about India becoming the second largest growing economy in the world. But what was the record of human development in the country? India�s position in the Human Development Report was continuously declining. A few years back it was 123; it slid down to 126, then 128 and now it has come down to the 134^th position among 182 countries. The government should act, said Pandhe, at least before it reaches the last position.

The government was implementing several schemes and lakhs of workers were employed to implement these schemes. But what are the conditions of these workers? Around 20 lakh women are employed as anganwadi workers and helpers in the Integrated Child Development Services scheme; but they are paid only Rs 1,500 and Rs 750 per month; more than six lakh women are employed as Accredited Social Health Activists under the National Rural Health Mission and these women are not even paid an honorarium; they are paid nominal incentives; more than 20 lakh of mid day meal workers are paid starvation wages. All of them are workers and the labour ministry must take up their interests, asserted Pandhe. Proper steps should be taken to improve their conditions.

The Indian Trade Union Act was not at all being implemented. It has become very difficult even to register a trade union. The Ramanujam Committee has recommended that if all the formalities required for the registration of a trade union were completed and the registrar of trade unions did not give the registration number within three months, then the union should be treated as automatically registered. Today, around a thousand applications of unions for registration under the trade union act are pending. But no action is taken by the labour ministry to ensure their registration. The labour ministry must give notice to the concerned officer seeking explanation as to why the registration number has not been given despite completing all the formalities. Only then the situation would improve.

No labour laws are being implemented in the special economic zones; in many states the units in the SEZs are exempted from implementation of labour laws; even trade unions are not allowed to be formed. Similarly in the IT sector, no trade union is allowed to be formed. The VV Giri National Labour Institute of the labour ministry has studied the conditions of the workers in the IT sector and has prepared a report, which says that the conditions of the workers in the IT sector are �comparable with those in 19^th century prisons� and with the conditions in �Roman slave ships�. But the labour ministry has not acted on the basis of the NLI report to improve the conditions of the IT employees. The report has nothing to say on these workers.

Pandhe also criticised the government on its apathetic attitude towards the safety of the workers. A very serious accident has occurred in BALCO in Chattisgarh, where the chimney under construction collapsed. In stead of taking serious action against those responsible for the accident, attempts are being made to destroy all evidence. All the workers working there were non locals, most of them coming from Jharkhand, Orissa etc; all of them have been sent back. It was clear that the material used for construction was of sub standard quality; but to suppress the fact, all the debris has been cleared. None of those responsible for this accident has been arrested.

The callous attitude of the government to the issue of health and safety of the workers was also evident by the total absence of any representative from the labour ministry in the seminar jointly organised by all the trade unions on ILO Convention 176 on health, safety and environment. While the topmost executive of the concerned department of ILO came all the way from Geneva to participate in the convention, neither the labour ministers nor the labour secretary could find any time for it.

While fully supporting the genuine grievances of the small employers, Pandhe criticised them for not allowing formation of trade unions and implementing labour laws like minimum wages etc for the workers in those establishments. He also strongly criticised the total collapse of the labour law administration; in most of the establishments, workers are made to work for 12 hours in a day; PF, ESI etc are not implemented; there are thousands of such enterprises just 40 kilometres from Delhi. But the labour department was doing nothing to ensure that the labour laws are implemented and those employers who flout labour laws are punished. He strongly demanded that the labour ministry as the name indicates must intervene in all matters in favour of labour and must take measures to revive tripartism.

P K Gurudasan, vice president of CITU and labour minister of Kerala, who co chaired the session as a representative of the state governments said that the global economic crisis has adversely impacted the exports from many states including Kerala. He also told that NREGA must be extended to the urban areas to provide some relief from the increasing job losses. He informed that Kerala has drafted the rules as required under the Unorganised Workers� Social Security Act. It has also prepared a draft Act for the interstate migrant workers. He said that coordinated efforts were needed between the state governments and the central government to provide social security for the migrant workers. He also demanded withdrawal of the changes made in the Employees� Pension scheme that are adversely affecting the employees.

Anadi Kumar Sahu, the labour minister of West Bengal informed that the state government has amended the Industrial Disputes Act providing for employing authorised officers and recovery officers for realisation of any money due to the workers from an employer under a settlement of an award or for realisation of dues arising out of closure or retrenchment. He suggested that similar amendment be made at the national level to be made applicable all over the country. He also informed that the West Bengal government was seriously considering amending the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Rule, 1972, to deny issue of licence for employment of contract labour in perennial nature of jobs. He too suggested creation of fund for the Unorganised Workers Social Security Act to benefit the unorganised workers.