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Labour activist arrested on charges of Maoist links

Eminent labour activist and lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj, along with four other civil rights activists, was arrested and placed under house arrest after the Pune police filed FIRs against them under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). While the state and central governments have argued that the arrests were as per legal procedure, based on evidence, the civil rights community has condemned these actions as a way to implicate dissenting voices and stifle democratic freedoms.

Sudha Bharadwaj has a long and distinguished record of fighting for the mine workers and the Adivasi communities of Chhattisgarh. She was part of the Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha, formed under the leadership of the legendary union leader Shankar Guha Niyogi in the 1980s.

While the recent arrests under UAPA have sparked a major controversy, governments have been using UAPA with its non-bailable clauses as a tool to silence labour activists for a long time. In January, workers attempting to form unions were arrested on the pretext of being Maoists involved in the Bhima Koregaon incident. A similar fate befell two workers attempting to form a union in Odisha in 2017.

Delhi government holds alternate skill development training for manual scavengers

The legislation on the abolition of manual scavenging also provided for rehabilitation of the workers liberated from the inhumane occupation. On the efforts of the Shahdara District Magistrate, the Delhi Government has initiated a pilot programme to skill those who had been surveyed as being employed in manual scavenging. The first batch of 26 workers showed a great extent of diversity in age as well as educational qualifications. If the pilot project succeeds, the Delhi government hopes it will be replicated across all districts in India. However, the efficacy of skill development programmes is minimal if the economy is not able to generate adequate jobs with remunerative wages.

Pricol workers on indefinite strike to counter a partial lockout

Hundreds of workers of Pricol limited, an automotive spare parts manufacturer, went on an indefinite strike from August 21 demanding that the company withdraws the partial lockout against 140 workers unconditionally. On August 14, the workers had gone on a one-day strike against the delay in negotiating a wage agreement. Following this, the company took disciplinary action and locked out over 140 workers. This has prompted a face-off between the union and the company, which is placing various conditions to lift the lockout. The workers have also petitioned the collector to resolve the issue. While wage agreements are signed for a specified period of years, ranging from 3 to 5 years, many companies find it profitable to delay renegotiating the wage agreements as it keeps the wages from rising. Various claims and disputes are often raised as an excuse to delay the process.

Assam oil workers and truckers strike

Workers and truckers who transport oil from the wells of Digboi went on a strike on August 27 and 28 against extortion by local groups, allegedly supported by the Digboi BJP MLA. These people, in the banner of Goloi Association, allegedly extort money from the truckers every day to let them transport oil from the marketing terminals of Indian Oil Corporation in the region. The strike was called off from August 29 after the administration assured them that a solution will be found soon. The Telegraph reported on August 30 that the strike was reinstated after the truckers came under attack once again.

Fishermen move Gujarat High Court against the suspension of fishing licence in a lake

Fishermen, through their association, have moved the Gujarat High Court against the suspension of their licence to fish in the Pratap Sagar lake. The licence had been suspended after the Brahmin community moved a PIL against the grant of a licence, stating that it hurt their religious sentiments. The suspension had come to force in early February this year. The association claims that on a further probe, they found that the local Brahmin community had raised complains against fishing in the lake. The high court has sent notices to the state government seeking their response to the petition.

Updates and other news

Bonded to the brick kilns: Migrant workers in Kashmir

Brick kilns across the country are notorious for employing bonded labour for abysmally low wages. They are forced to work extremely long hours, kept in isolation and don’t have access to rights. This article in Kashmir Reader documents the condition of the migrants who come to Kashmir to work in the kilns. They are often lured with loans. They are paid as low as Rs. 75/- for a day of work, citing various deductions. They also have to suffer health ailments due to exposure to harmful chemicals during the baking of the bricks in high temperature. The article recounts how successive governments have failed in their promise to curb the practice of bonded labour.

Resident doctors at King George’s Medical University go on strike

Nearly 800 resident doctors threatened to go on an indefinite strike if their demand for pay parity with doctors at the central university for medicine was not met. In a letter to the officials, the resident doctors’ association has claimed that the government went back on their promise to meet their demands by April this year. While the Vice Chancellor has called for a meeting to discuss the issue, the association feels it’s high time their demands are met.

Port workers to get a pay hike

More than 32,000 port workers and 1.05 lakh Group C and D pensioners across the country will benefit from a new wage agreement signed before the Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner (Central) in the presence of Union Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari.
The tripartite settlement for a period of five years having retrospective effect from January 1, 2017, was signed between the management of major Indian ports and the Central Labour Federation of Leaders of India Major Port and Dock Workers. The overall financial implication of this settlement for workers in all major ports and pensioners is likely to be about Rs. 560 crore per annum. As per the new wage agreement, the settlement provides for 10.6 pc fitment on basic pay plus dearness allowance. The lowest grade of workers would get a pay-scale of Rs 20,900-43,600 and the highest grade worker Rs. 36,500-88,700.

RBI staff to go on mass casual leave on September 4th and 5th

The United Forum of Reserve Bank Officers and Employees has said that its members will go on a mass casual leave on September 4 and 5 to press their demands relating to contributory pensions. In a press release, the association has stated, "To express deep resentment at the attitude of the officials of the Government of India, RBI staff members have waited too long and the limit of patience is crossing and are left with no alternative but to observe two consecutive days’ strike action (Mass casual leave on September 4 and 5, 2018)".

RBI report blames MGNREGA for causing labour crisis in agriculture

The annual report from the Reserve Bank of India has concluded that MGNREGS are responsible for causing a shortage of farm hands for agriculture. The survey has found a large-scale preference for MGNREGS work rather than farm work. More casual workers preferred the work in MGNREGS, especially in poorer states like Odisha, Bihar and UP. The reason, the report highlights, was the parity of wage for women. It advocates planning MGNREGS work in such a manner so as to keep labour available for farm work during the seasons. While it is clear from the report that even the minimally higher wages under MGNERGS could be an incentive for workers, the report also states that increase in Minimum Support Price for agricultural products will lead to inflation.

International

Argentina educators strike against budget cuts

Thousands of teachers, joined by their students, took to the streets of Buenos Aires, demanding a restoration of the budget support for higher education and the increase in salary of the teachers to compensate for the high rates of inflation. With the Argentine economy on a high inflation mode yet again, the government had introduced deep cuts to budget spending, especially in education. This led to calls from the teachers for a wage increase commensurate with inflation to maintain real wages. While the government continued to negotiate for a lesser wage hike, the teachers decided to join the university professors on an indefinite strike to press their point. University professors have been on a strike for the past month, demanding a 30% rise in the salaries to meet the fall of real wages due to inflation.

Trade union leader in Iran sentenced to 10 years of jail, 74 lashes

Education International released a statement condemning the arrest and sentencing of Mohammad Habibi, an Iranian teacher and board member of the Iranian Teachers Trade Association of Teheran. He had been sentenced to 10 and half years in prison and suffer 74 lashes for organising demonstrations against the government. The statement claims that the demonstration itself was peaceful but 14 members, including Habibi, were arrested. While the rest were released the next day, Habibi was charged and sentenced. The Education International joins the International Trade Union Confederation and the IAWSI in demanding an immediate and unconditional release of Mohammad Habibi.

Trump goes against federal employee salaries after court restrains him from firing them

Donald Trump has taken his fight with federal employees a step further by deciding to cancel the coming year’s annual wage increase. He has justified this move by stating the need for maintaining a fiscally sustainable government. But the Trump supported the Republican budget that passed a year ago had created a large deficit in the budget due to tax cuts for the rich. Earlier in the week, his executive orders to fire federal staff at will were invalidated by a Federal judge who upheld the right of the workers against arbitrary retrenchments. This was hailed as a major victory for the unions. The move to freeze wage rates has come for condemnation by the workers, the unions and the democratic party.

Weekend reading

When America sought to replace Mexican migrants with high school students
While we all recognise as fact that migrants have a tough job and get paid less, we often do not experience what it really means to be a migrant worker. The work looks simple on paper, their toil is often invisible, leaving us with only an academic knowledge. The US has had a chequered history with migrants, especially Latin American migrants. The migrants do the bulk of the manual labour in the farms, and yet they are paid very poor wages. Apart from this, they also have to suffer xenophobic reactions from the rest. But why can’t farmers replace the Mexicans with American workers? It was tried as early as 1965. Here is an article from National Public Radio on the experiences of the high schoolers who volunteered to work the farms in the summer, after the program to employ Mexican workers came to an end in 1965. The then labour secretary gave a patriotic call to the high schoolers and they came in droves, only to experience first-hand the insurmountable pain of labour. Soon the programme collapsed with most of the high schoolers quitting early. The migrants have come back to do the jobs that US citizens don’t desire. Once again the xenophobic rhetoric blazes away, this time from the White House itself. But the participants of the social experiment of the 60s know too well what it means to be a migrant farm worker.

Many a slip between labourers and their dreams

How deep is the passion of labourers to till their own land? How many traps lie in between the dream and the reality? These are the questions that a recently released award-winning Tamil film Meerku Thodarchi Malai (The Western Ghats) captures with acute realism. Travelling with the people who live and work these bountiful yet treacherous slopes of Western Ghats, the movie captures the flattering aspirations of the poor landless labourers. A must watch film for the distinct storytelling, cinematography and critique of the development paradigm that leaves the toiling masses poor, even as it benefits others.

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