MEETING OF STANDING LABOUR COMMITTEE

MEETING OF STANDING LABOUR COMMITTEE

THE meeting of the Standing Labour Committee (SLC), held on 4 January at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi with Union labour minister Mallikarjun Kharge in the chair, finalized the agenda for the 45th Indian Labour Conference (ILC), scheduled to be held on 14-15 February, 2013. The agenda includes (1) service conditions, wages and social security for all categories of central government’s and state governments’ scheme workers; (2) social security with special reference to assured pension with indexation for all workers; (3) labour laws for small and medium scale industries; and (4) employability and employment.

The meeting was attended by the representatives of central trade unions, employers’ organisations and of central and state governments. CITU was represented by its general secretary Tapan Sen and secretary Swadesh Dev Roye; its state general secretaries, M. L. Malkotia of Delhi and Surender Singh Malik of Haryana.

Representatives of the employers’ organizations, as before, insisted on inclusion in the agenda the labour flexibility for free adjustment with volatility of labour market and made categorical statement that the existing labour laws were old and archaic and could not be implemented. This statement clearly substantiates the unions’ complaints about labour law violations becoming permanent phenomenon in most of the workplaces.

Intervening in the discussion, Tapan Sen pointed out about government’s complete inaction in implementing ILC’s unanimous recommendation on fixing minimum wages as per 15th ILC formula and on the basis of relevant Supreme Court judgments; and on amendment of the Minimum Wages Act in that direction. This exposes government’s biased approach in favour of small number of employers. This approach of the government encourages rampant violation of legal provisions depriving 70 per cent workers of the country from getting their existing statutory minimum wages. Same is the fate of recommendations on social security measures where existing provisions of various social security schemes are being violated by the employers with impunity.

Recommendations of successive ILCs on employability and employment generations have also been treated by the government with same contempt. Unemployment situation is becoming worse with the growth of GDP. This means that the gains of GDP growth, created by the workers, are being totally usurped by the employers’ class with abetment by the governments, both directly and indirectly, through state-sponsored violations of labour laws in all respects. Sen cited recent examples of unlawful en masse dismissals of workers in Maruti Suzuki plant at Manesar without holding departmental enquiry with active connivance of the Congress-led state government who resorted to mass scale arrests of the workers and their union leaders on fabricated charges and by de-registration of the union without any prior notice.

Representatives of all central trade unions pointed out about government not taking action / even initiate implementation of unanimous recommendations of 44th ILC on minimum wages, social security and on employability and employment generation. This virtually converted this highest tripartite forum on labour into a talking shop exposing the anti-labour character of the government. Trade union representatives conveyed with one voice their resolve to go in for two days general strike on 20-21 February 2013 against such anti-labour policies of the government.