People's Democracy

CITU GENERAL COUNCIL CALL

Prepare For Countrywide General Strike On Sept 29

Tapan Sen

THE CITU held a four-day session of its general council on July 23-26, 2005 at Alappuzha, Kerala. The meeting emphasised the need to heighten the united struggle of the toiling people to halt the aggressive pursuit of the neoliberal economic policies by the government of India; it called upon the working class to ensure broadest mobilisation in the campaign for countrywide general strike on September 29, 2005. Around 400 members from all over the country attended the general council.

After hoisting of CITU flag by M K Pandhe, president, CITU and paying floral homage at the martyr’s column, the session began on July 23 with a welcome address by K Prasad, general secretary, Alleppey district CITU.

INAUGURAL SESSION

M K Pandhe in his presidential address dealt in detail the developments in the international arena, which is marked by rising waves of struggle by the working class and determined expression of anguish of the common people against the grievous impact of neoliberal imperialist globalisation and related policy drives.  The number of general strikes in the European countries like Italy, France, Portugal, Spain etc and strike struggles in South Africa, South Korea and the countries in the Latin American region and other areas during the span of last one and half years – all directed against the onslaught of the rights, social security and livelihoods of the working people – reflected the growing resistance against the neoliberal policy regime. This regime is basically driven by the obsession of pampering the foreign investors at the cost of peoples’ rights and livelihood as well as national interests. The aggravation of poverty, unemployment, industrial closures and sickness and sharp decline in the quality of employment worldwide mocks at the claim that the neoliberal policies will bring growth and prosperity for all, asserted Pandhe. He also pointed out that during the last one and half decade long pursuit of neoliberal policies, the developing countries have experienced net outflow of resources from the developing economies to benefit the giant multinational companies of the imperialist countries, thereby mocking at the claim of the votaries of neoliberalism and also the neo-convert FDI-fanatics that the neoliberal policies will bring in resources for the developing countries for their all round development. In the background of the rising struggles worldwide, the Indian working class movement has also to make more effective intervention against the disastrous policy regime and its political mentors through united countrywide struggle, Pandhe reiterated.

Chittabrata Majumdar, general secretary, CITU, placed the general secretary’s report in the meeting. The report dealt mainly on the national developments since the last CITU working committee meeting held at Agartala in October 2004 and the activities during the said period. The report pointed out that the defeat of the NDA regime and installation of the UPA government at the centre had created high expectations among the people. The dependence of the UPA dispensation on the Left Parties has led to the UPA combine making certain pro-people commitments like social security legislations for the unorganised sector and agricultural workers, employment guarantee for 100 days in a year to every poor and lower middle class household, revival of sick industries, etc. But one year of UPA regime revealed that instead of taking urgent steps for effective implementation of the pro-people commitments made in the CMP, the UPA government was pushing through the same neoliberal policies of earlier NDA regime – through disinvestments in profit making PSUs, non-revival of sick industries, privatisation of pension and social security schemes, retrograde restructuring of the financial sector and also other vital and strategic sector of the economy in the interest of the foreign capital etc. The peasantry is also getting a raw deal under the neoliberal policy regime as reflected in the still continuing acute distress and suicides among the farmers in certain regions, farmers agitation for irrigation water in Rajasthan etc. The workers’ rights are being trampled underfoot through deliberate non-enforcement of basic labour laws pertaining to minimum wages, social security benefits, safety and basic trade union rights throughout the country as reflected in the happenings in J&K, UP, Haryana, Punjab, Maharashtra, Orissa, Bihar and other parts of country. The State administration, in most of the places have been virtually acting as kitchen administration of the employers in the matter of labour rights, thereby giving rise to an anarchic situation in the industrial relations scenario, asserted Majumdar. In this background of growing resentment among the mass of the working people, the communal and disruptive forces have been trying to fish in troubled waters despite the fact that they are also champions of the same anti-people policy regime. In this background, the report emphasised the urgent need for widest mobilisation of the working class movement in combating the challenges arising out of the pursuit of the same neoliberal anti-people policies by the UPA government at the centre.

Majumdar pointed out that the Sponsoring Committee of Trade Unions comprising the central trade unions and the All India Employees Federations have decided to go in for countrywide general strike on September 29, 2005 to protest against the anti-people policies of the UPA regime and also to press for immediate implementation of the pro-people commitments in the CMP. The widest mobilisation of working people in countrywide action is also crucially important in isolating the anti-national communal and disruptive forces. The CITU must gear up for making the general strike total throughout the country, reiterated Majumdar. 

FOCUS ON STRUGGLE

In all, 54 members including eight members from the fraternal organisations took part in the discussion on the general secretary’s report. They laid emphasis on building widest unity at the grass root level in the struggle against globalisation. Unity effort should also embrace fraternal mass organisations to involve people from all walks of life in the united struggle. The deliberations also focused on total anarchy in the enforcement of basic labour laws throughout the country, particularly in the private sector and MNCs, imposing subhuman conditions on the working people with the governments at the centre and in most of the states actively aiding this process. Labour inspection mechanism has been practically dismantled in most of the states in the name of investment-friendliness and in the obsession of wooing foreign investors. Both in the organised sector and obviously in the unorganised sector, the basic labour laws pertaining to minimum wages, social security like PF, ESI etc and safety provisions are being trampled underfoot. Mass scale contractorisation is taking place even in government sector and departments, totally in violation of the existing statute.  Under the neoliberal economic regime, those in governance, in collusion with employers, deliberately promote non-enforcement of labour laws, as a prelude to pro-employer changes in labour laws to usher in a ‘hire & fire’ regime. The issue of non-enforcement of labour laws, thus, has to be taken up as one of the central demands in the forthcoming struggle.  

The general council denounced the atrocious move of the government to privatise pension and to allow FDI in pension sector. The PFRDA Bill, introduced by the government in parliament, is aimed at dismantling whatever meagre social security rights the workers are having on date. The posture being made by the government that the PFRDA legislation will ensure providing social security coverage to the workers of the unorganised sector is nothing but an outright fraud. The legislation seeks to finally relieve the government from all its responsibility of providing minimum social security to the working people and force them to wholly purchase their own social security scheme. And by pushing through this legislation, the government seeks to shrug off its commitment to provide social security for unorganised sector and agricultural workers as made in the CMP. This is also aimed at diverting the social security savings of the people to the stock market for speculation. The government policy towards social security and interest rate on social security savings have also put the Employees Pension Scheme 1995 into total jeopardy and the government is already making a move to further reduce the already meagre benefits available under EPS 1995. W R Varada Rajan, secretary, CITU, explained in detail the real import of the PFRDA Bill and the government approach towards social security as a whole and called for unleashing an elaborate campaign on the issues at the grass root level. He also explained the retrograde move of the government to introduce a new series of price index with 2001 as the base year, computation of which suffers from many imperfections and arbitrariness leading to gross underestimation of the price movements and resultant loss to workers in dearness allowance. The central t            trade unions jointly opposed the introduction of the new series and demanded full fledged consultations on the whole gamut of price-index calculations.

TOWARDS A CADRE POLICY

The general council had a separate session to discuss on the cadre policy based on a paper presented by the CITU secretariat titled, “Cadre development in trade union movement”. Kanai Banerjee, secretary, CITU, presented the discussion note, which dealt with the various aspects of cadre development in the trade union movement. It also focused on concrete initiatives to be taken up by the CITU units at all levels to equip the leadership and activists in confronting the ideological, economic and social offensives of the policy of neoliberal imperialist globalisation and also by obscurantist and fundamentalist forces and expand and consolidate its base. A total of 28 comrades took part in the special discussion and put forward many vital suggestions enriching the note.

As the session continued, news of the barbaric police attack on the peaceful rally of the workers of Honda Motorcycles and Scooters Ltd at Gurgaon on July 25 injuring several hundreds and mass scale arrests was received. The meeting condemned the police atrocities and sent a telegram to Haryana chief minister demanding punishment of the concerned police officials and reinstatement of all retrenched workmen of Honda and release of all arrested workers. The general council also passed a resolution denouncing the police atrocities at Gurgaon and condemning the Haryana government for operating in collusion with the Honda management in allowing blatant violation of labour laws and suppressing the trade union rights of the workers. The council also decided to observe a protest day on August 1, 2005 throughout the country to denounce police repression and express solidarity with the struggling workers of Gurgaon.

The general council also adopted a resolution expressing solidarity with the struggle of the farmers of Sri Ganganagar district of Rajasthan fighting for adequate supply of irrigation water braving police atrocities and demanded release of Hetram Beniwal, president of Rajasthan state CITU, arrested in connection with that struggle. By another resolution, the meeting extended support to the struggle of construction workers at Banihal, J&K.

Other resolutions adopted were: against fraudulent computation of price index resulting in reduction by 30 points in Maharashtra leading to loss of DA; in support of cashew workers’ agitation in Kerala; against non-inclusion of workers’ representative in the reconstituted Coir Board; extending solidarity with the struggle of glass bangle workers of Ferozabad, UP and condemning police repression on them; against unlawful closure of M/s Korpan Ltd in Maharashtra.

Chittabrata Majumdar, general secretary CITU summed up the four-day deliberations of the general council and M K Pandhe delivered the concluding address. The general council reiterated the need for vigorous effort to unite the workers at the grass root level across the affiliations in the struggle against the economic policies, against onslaught on labour rights and against the communal and disruptive forces.

On the concluding day i.e. on the afternoon of July 26, a huge public rally was held in the Municipal Maidan of Alleppey. Around two lakh workers and common people converged at the Maidan in twelve processions from different parts of the town. Most of the processions could not enter the meeting ground owing to paucity of space. P K Gurudasan, general secretary, Kerala state CITU presided. M K Pandhe, Chittabrata Majumdar and V S Achuthanandan, leader of the opposition in Kerala assembly addressed the public meeting.