People's Democracy

Court Arrest Programme in Tamilnadu

A K Padmanabhan

MORE than 50,000 workers, including thousands of women, courted arrest in more than 100 centres all over Tamilnadu on July 23. The Tamilnadu state committee of the CITU had called for the court arrest programme to protest against the ESMA enacted by the state government and various anti-people policies of the central and state governments. The issues raised by the CITU included privatisation, sickness in industries, labour law amendments, social security for unorganised workers and denial of bonus and other existing benefits to workers.

The court arrest programme was the culmination of a 2 months long campaign conducted by CITU unions all over the state.

State CITU president J Hemachandran led the volunteers in Nagercoil. More than 5000 workers including 1000 women were arrested here.

In Chennai, A Soundrarajan led more than 5000 workers including 1000 women.

In Madurai town, state CITU general secretary T K Rengarajan led more than 2000 volunteers including 300 women.

State CITU secretary T A Latha led the volunteers at Madurantakam in Kanchipuram district. State CITU office bearers and executive committee members led the volunteers in various other districts.

The CITU has decided to continue the struggle on its own and, wherever possible, jointly with other unions.

A joint committee of central trade union organisations and associations of central and state government employees and teachers has already been formed to conduct the struggle against the anti-labour policies of the central and state governments. In the first phase of the programme, demonstrations were organised in all district centres on July 30.