People's Democracy
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
No. 36
September 09, 2012
|
Vol. XXXVI
No. 36 September 09, 2012 |
GURGAON Ruling Class Offensive
Against Workers Intensifies Jai Bhagwan THE
recent episode in the
Manesar plant of Maruti Suzuki in (Gurgaon, Haryana), which
claimed the life of
a company official, has provided a big opportunity to the
ruling classes to
launch a veritable attack on the working class struggles.
The kind of venomous tirade
which the ruling class parties, the indigenous corporate
houses, their captive
media and the multinational corporations have launched
against the industrial
workers is something quite unique. COMPANY SUCCEEDS IN ITS CONSPIRACY What
happened in the
Manesar plant of Maruti Suzuki on July 18 was not something
accidental but a
consequence of the conspiracy which the management of the
company have since
long been hatching. Last year, the workers of the plant had
conducted an
agitation for something which is in fact their fundamental
right --- to have a
union of their choice. It was a historic agitation in which
the workers sat on
a dharna in the company premises for about a month, but did
not allow anybody
to cause even a little harm to the company’s property.
However, the company’s
officials had had no appreciation for the workers’ sense of
probity. These
officials went to the extent of bribing some 30 union office
leaders --- in the
hope that and no worker would have any faith in any union in
future. But what
happened was to the contrary; by their own experience the
workers came to realise
how indispensable a union was for them. That was why they
constantly rejected
the management’s pressure that they must have a ‘workers
committee’ indeed. The
management finally allowed them to get a union registered
but on the condition
that it would not be affiliated to any central trade union
organisation. This
was in gross violation of the Trade Union Act. After the
union’s registration,
the workers gave to the management a memorandum of their
demands on March 18;
their main demands were a raise in their wages and the
regularisation of
contract workers. The company adopted a dithering attitude
on these demands for
about four months and ultimately, on July 16, it effected a
nominal increase in
the salaries of permanent employees but also added adamantly
that they would
not talk about any other demand. About the contract workers
(TTs, casuals,
apprentices), who number about 2,000, the management said
they would not
entertain any demand for wage rise or regularisation. This
angered the workers
a lot and the union refused to accept this kind of an
agreement. It was after
all the solid and fighting unity of the permanent and
contract workers that had
made the last year’s victory possible. The management was
out to break this
unity and the workers were determined not to make this game
succeed. The
immediate cause of
what happened was the suspension of a worker and the
resultant controversy.
This was the time when, as sources pointed out, the company
egged on its
bouncers (a recent honourable term for paid goons) and some
of the contractors’
men --- all of them in the company’s uniform --- to engage
in arson and resort
to provocative actions. In the meantime there was a fire in
the company’s
premises --- its cause is yet to be ascertained --- and a
manager of the
company died because of suffocation as he had fracture in
his legs and was
unable to come out of the premises in time. It was this very
unfortunate death
that is now being used as an alibi for launching an all-out
attack on the
workers and their struggles. While this took place at about
7 in the evening,
60 to 70 policemen were already deployed on the spot,
besides hundreds of the
company’s guards as well as internal intelligence people.
Thus the question is:
why these people failed to anticipate the event? Why did the
policemen not
intervene in time? This conspiracy needs to be exposed. STATE, POLICE REPRESSION How
our own compatriots may
be subjected to all sorts of cruelties in order to keep the
foreign capital in
good humour --- this one may well learn from the Congress
government of
Haryana. After the said episode, the state government posted
a group of 550
Armed Forces jawans in the area on a permanent basis and
with immediate effect
in order to safeguard the company’s interests, and also
constituted a special
investigation team (SIT). For court pleadings, the state
government appointed a
private advocate instead of choosing one from the already
existing panel of
government pleaders. Clauses of murder and conspiracy to
murder were foisted
against 55 nominated and 600 other workers even though it
was known to one and
all that the said company official had died due to
asphyxiation. So far, 154
workers have been taken into custody, tortured and then put
behind bars. Houses
of Maruti workers are being raided; there are cases in which
their family
members too have been taken into custody. Out of the fear
that FDI flow into
the state may stop, the state government is continuing its
campaign of wild
repression against the workers, under pressure from the
indigenous and foreign
corporates. The lists of those to be arrested are not based
on any police
investigation but include the names being given by the
managements. Not only
that; the company has so far terminated the services of 546
workers, without
any chargesheet or notice, and sent the information to the
bank where these
workers have accounts. The
situation of
repression is such that when 18 dismissed Maruti workers
came to the CITU
office, the police arrested nine of them after they came out
and were in the
street. The police is maintaining a watch on the offices of
central trade union
organisations as well. The CITU, Sarva Karmachari Sangh and
some other
organisations had had to gherao the office of superintendent
of police (SP) in
order to register their protest. Yet,
the state government,
the police administration and the labour department are all
busy safeguarding
the Maruti Suzuki’s interests since the said unsavoury
episode. Another
shameful thing that no political party, except the Left, is
prepared to speak a
word against the repression the workers are being subjected
to. Rather, they
are siding with the company. In the name of so called
panchayats, some of the
contractors and transporters belonging to villages in the
adjoining areas are
spitting venom against the workers and trade unions. A large
part of the media,
which are in fact controlled by one or another big business
house, has not left
any stone unturned in order to demonise the workers. None of
these is willing
to go into the basic causes behind the episode. TRADE UNIONS READY TO FIGHT The
trade unions have
fully grasped the seriousness of the attack that has been
launched against them
and the working class. On August 4, all the central trade
union organisations
and industrial unions organised a Gurgaon level meeting and
submitted a
petition to the deputy commissioner of Gurgaon on August 7.
While describing
the July 18 episode as unfortunate, the petition demanded a
high level inquiry
into it to unearth the basic, underlying causes that led to
this situation. It
demanded an end to the plant’s lockout (now not in force),
restoration of the
pre-July 18 situation and reinstatement of all workers in
job without any
discrimination. (The
petition also
demanded an end to the lockout in Eastern Medicate and a
restart of its
operations. It is to be noted that its owner and manager are
absconding for the
last three months, while about 1,500 workers and employees
of the company come
to the factory gate everyday and are conducting a peaceful
agitation for its
reopening.) In
view of the seriousness
of the situation, the central trade union organisations held
a joint
state-level meeting at It is
notable that the
central trade union organisations have not been given any
appointment for a
meeting with the chief minister despite repeated requests,
while he and his
labour minister have met the representatives and federations
of industrial
houses several times in the intervening period.
PROTEST ACTIONS ALL OVER HARYANA Widespread
protest actions
took place all over Haryana on August 17, at the call of the
central trade
union organisations. While the CITU mobilised a large number
of workers for
these actions, cadres of the AITUC, HMS, BMS and Sarva
Karmachari Sangh too
made energetic efforts in all the districts. Gurgaon
witnessed a huge mass
meeting on the day; more than 10,000 workers --- those
belonging to 50-odd big
industrial unions and also the non-unionised workers ---
took art in this
meeting. A large number of workers from the Manesar plant of
Maruti Suzuki as
well as four other plants of the same company also joined. Addressing
the meeting,
which took place in the Goshala Maidan near the Gurgaon bus
stand, CITU state
president Satbir Singh said the workers won’t allow the
conspiracy to demonise
the workers and trade unions to succeed. He said it is
unjust to ignore the
workers’ contribution to the development of Haryana. These
sons and daughters
of the Indian peasants and other toilers are making, with
their sweat and blood,
mighty contributions to the country’s and the state’s
development but are yet
deprived of their due recognition as well as remuneration,
while a foreign
company is treating them like its slaves and trampling all
the labour laws
underfoot. Shamefully, the state government is unashamedly
siding with the same
company. Satbir Singh said the Maruti Suzuki earned a profit
of Rs 2289 crore
in 2010-11, as against only Rs 105 crore in 2001-02, which
means a 2200 per
cent increase in its profit over a ten-year period. But
while all this has been
possible by the untiring labour of the workers, the company
is not willing to
give the workers any rise in the wages. IT’S A CLASS OFFENSIVE After
the meeting,
thousands of workers took out a procession through the main
thoroughfares of
Gurgaon and later submitted a memorandum of their demands to
the deputy
commissioner for its onward transmission to the chef
minister. The
CITU has made it clear
that the ongoing offensive of the company management ---
with help from the
state government, the police and administration, the media
and the so-called
bouncers who are in fact paid goons --- is nothing but a
class offensive
against the working class. Using the July 18 episode as a
pretext, the
multinationals and others are making all-out efforts to
finish for ever the
trade union rights which the workers have won after
protracted fights and
numerous sacrifices. However,
the widespread protest
actions and mass meeting on August 17 have demonstrated
beyond a shred of doubt
that the working class realises the class nature of the
ongoing offensive, is uniting
against it and is equally determined to foil the conspiracy.
