India

On 3 December 2021, the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) suspended over 192 staff and dismissed 61, taking the total number of workers suspended to 9,384 and those dismissed to 1,980. A total of 80,00 employees were taking part in the strike that began on 28 October and intensified from 9 November, paralysing the state-run bus service. Workers were seeking a merger of the cash-strapped corporation with the state government in the hope of better salaries and other benefits.
On 9 December, MSRTC suspended another 150 employees and terminated the services of two daily wage workers for taking part in the strike, which continued for the 43^rd day. An MSRTC spokesperson said the number of suspended employees had risen to 10,180 and the number of sacked daily wage workers to 2,029.
By 11 February 2022, the strike had been going on for 100 days. Official statistics compiled on 7 February showed that of the 96,000 employees, 11,024 had been suspended and nearly 7,608 dismissed. A total of 8,629 employees had been issued with a show-cause notice for dismissal and were awaiting hearings.

Police in Andhra Pradesh arrested teachers on their way to protest demonstrations, blocked access routes to the demonstration sites, and held union leaders under house arrest.
The protest demonstration was organised on 20 January 2022 by the Federation of Andhra Pradesh Teachers’ Organisations (FAPTO) to protest their latest pay review, which they said amounted to a pay cut, and reductions in their rent allowance.
Police established roadblocks in several cities to intimidate and restrict protesters, making it easier for them to carry out the arrests. The president and general secretary of the teachers’ federation, K. Bhanu Murthy and P. Panduranga Varaprasad, strongly condemned the arrests, saying they were preventing them from making their voice heard. Protesting teachers were bundled into police vans and taken to police stations.
Reports also said that key leaders of the teachers’ associations were placed under house arrest in various cities.
The teachers said their protest would continue.

Dr Anuj Aggrawal, general secretary of the Resident Doctors’ Association (RDA) at Safdarjung Hospital, said he and around 200 doctors were detained and taken to the Rajendra Nagar Police Station on 27 December 2021. They were released that night.
The young doctors, hailed as frontline Covid-19 heroes, had been protesting for several days at delays in a counselling process. They had grown impatient after several fruitless meetings with the health minister.
Dr Anuj said he was shocked at the brutal behaviour of the police. Several women doctors were dragged by male officers, and when they tried to record what was happening, the police took their phones. Some male officers allegedly behaved inappropriately with the young women doctors in what Dr Anuj described as “a very shameful incident.”
The Federation of Resident Doctors’ Association (FORDA) also alleged that “police force was used and many doctors were injured” during their dramatic face-off. Police denied allegations of lathi charges and use of abusive language by them, and said12 protestors were detained and released later. Some reports said a total of 2,500 young doctors had been detained.
The protest was called off on 31 December.

UrbanClap Technologies India Pvt. Ltd, a home services provider, sought a permanent prohibitory injunction from Gurugram district court restraining its employees – all women – from holding any “demonstration, dharna, rally, gherao, peace march,” and from “shouting slogans, entering or assembling on or near the office premises”.
The lawsuit called on the workers to cease their “illegal” protest and vacate the company’s office, main entrance and parking area, and asked the court to direct the local police to disperse the protesters.
About 50 employees of Urban Company’s salon and spa, or “partners” as they termed them, began their protest outside the company’s offices on 20 December 2021, against policy changes proposed by the company that would impact their earnings.
The workers were opposed to a new subscription system where they would have to pay a deposit upfront and complete a monthly target of 40 jobs to retain their deposit. Many feared they would not be able to complete the target and would therefore lose money. In addition, the new rules did not allow for any flexibility in their hours, even though they were supposed to be contractors. Those who refused to opt in to the new system would only be allowed to work on high demand days – Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.

Sixty-seven workers and activists were detained by Tamil Nadu police during a protest on 18 December 2021 by electronics workers and were held for more than 24 hours. Twenty-two activists, including leaders of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), were then put behind bars for extending support to the workers and visiting them. The CITU leaders were granted bail and were expected to be released on 23 December.
The protest, by around 3,000 women workers employed by Bharat FIH, a subsidiary of FIH Mobile and Foxconn Technology Group, which manufactures mobile phones, began at midnight on 17 December.
It was triggered by an incident two days earlier in which 159 workers had fallen ill due to food poisoning at their hostel. The workers were hospitalised, but no information was released about their state of health, despite inquiries from their colleagues, and rumours started circulating, including the story (false) that two of the workers had died.
Finally, the workers decided to press their point home by blocking the highway for more than eight hours. Finally, the district administration agreed to talk to them and release details about the hospitalised workers. The majority had been discharged after a short hospital stay, while four had been kept in because their condition was more serious, but they were recovering.
The workers ended their protest, but by then other grievances had come to light, not the least of which being the unhygienic conditions in the hostel that had led to the food poisoning. The workers, all hired through contractors, had long complained of overcrowding and poor food. The factory was shut down while improvements were made to the dormitories and dining rooms. A gradual re-opening began from 10 January 2022.

Indian Telephone Industries (ITI) Limited ITI laid off more than 80 workers after they formed a union. The workers were notified that they had been sacked when they arrived for work on 1 December 2021 and have since been refused entry.
The Bengaluru-based factory makes telecommunication tools, including military communication equipment deployed in border areas. During the pandemic, workers also manufactured ventilators to meet the surge in demand.
Tension between the workers and ITI management began in June 2020 when the workers were told that they wouldn’t be paid their salaries for the first lockdown. The workers were advised to address the courts for redressal.
They then formed the Karnataka General Labour Union (KGLU) and pursued litigation against the company, demanding two months’ pay, eight months’ Provident Fund contributions and employees’ state insurance, five months of overtime and 10 months of salary arrears.
The legal process was very slow, and in the meantime tensions mounted, until workers arrived at the factory gates on 1 December to be sacked without notice. They were informed that their contract had come to an end. As Hemanth Kumar R., the president of the KGLU, pointed out, the contract system was a sham because most had been working at the plant for many years – over 35 years in some cases.
All those who had joined the union were laid off; the remaining 40 or so employees were allowed to continue working.
The legal case over their pay demands dragged on, and the dismissed workers staged a protest outside the factory gates, which continued into February 2022.

At least eight people, including four farmers, were killed on 3 October 2021 when violence broke out in India’s Uttar Pradesh state after a convoy of cars linked to a federal minister’s son ran over a group of farmers protesting against farm laws, according to local media report.
Farmers’ unions said the son of India’s deputy home minister, Ajay Kumar Mishra, was in one of the cars involved.
Two farmers were killed after being hit by the car. In subsequent violence, three members of the governing Bharatiya Janata Party, a driver and two other farmers were killed, according to the party and officials.
Farmers’ unions were staging a demonstration on the road when the incoming cavalcade ran over a group of protesters in a dramatic escalation of their ten-month-old protest against farm laws that they say will benefit corporations at the cost of millions of farmers.
Rakesh Tikait, a leading farmer leader, condemned the violence and called on the government to arrest those responsible for the farmers’ deaths. The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) went further, accusing the son of the union minister of state for home affairs of deliberately running his vehicle over the farmers. It was also reported by eyewitnesses, claimed the CITU, that government staff had also fired at the unarmed kisans (small farmers). The minister denied his son was involved.
CITU also reported that the following day police brutally assaulted the finance secretary of the farmers’ union All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), P. Krishnaprasad, as he addressed media during a peaceful protest at Uttar Pradesh Bhavan in Delhi against the killing of the farmers.
In August, in the northern Haryana state, one farmer was killed and ten others injured in police action during a protest against the farm laws.

The Thiruvananthapuram Kerala Bank brought in new rules limiting the union activities of its staff. Under the new rules, the unions may not intervene in any decisions relating to transfers. Shortly after that announcement, two women leaders of the Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI) were transferred outside their district.
Both women, named as C. Geetha and B. C. Leena, were members of the BEFI Women’s Subcommittee, and both worked in the same unit. They were transferred to two different places, with immediate effect. BEFI believes they were transferred for taking leave from the bank to take part in the union’s General Council Convention, rather than attending a meeting convened by the chairman and CEO of the bank.

Nine office bearers of the BMW India Staff and Employees Union were given forced leave of absence until further notice on 23 August 2021 at the BMW’s factory at the Mahindra City near Chennai. The union was in negotiation with management for a pay review, delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Management claimed that discussions between staff and union officials about the pay review were taking place during working hours and impairing productivity.
Two days later, about 300 workers were locked out for refusing to sign a document imposing workplace restrictions before being allowed to enter the factory. The document, which included rules restricting mobile phone usage, was to ensure better productivity and workplace discipline management claimed.
The wage negotiations later resumed, and agreement was finally reached at the end of September.

Around 25 health workers, including their leader, Laxmi Kaurav, were arrested for staging a demonstration in Bhopal on 24 June. They had been on strike since 1 June to demand a pay rise but had been warned by the administration against holding a demonstration during the pandemic.
They disregarded that advice, however, when threats were made that they could lose their jobs.

Around 150 unemployed teachers were detained while over a dozen received minor injuries as police cane-charged them twice during a protest near Punjab’s Chief Minister’s residence in Patiala on 8 June 2021, in a repeat of incidents earlier in the year.
The five unions involved were frustrated at delays in meeting with them and dealing with their demands.
The teachers clashed with police as they were marching towards the chief minister’s residence.
“We were holding a peaceful protest when police used force to remove us,” said union state president Deepak Kumar, adding that despite multiple assurances, the government has failed to provide them jobs in government schools.
Those detained were later released without charge.

In May 2021, IndustriALL global union sent a joint letter, with the Swiss union Unia and human rights organisation Multiwatch, to the CEO of Novartis, based in Switzerland, to intervene to put an end to union-busting practices at Novartis India.
In January 2017, the Novartis Employees Union (NEU) and management agreed on a memorandum of settlement (MoS), whereby both parties commit to meeting three times a year to solve grievances. Not only was this not followed; management unilaterally tried to change employment conditions instead of using the established collective bargaining process.
The MoS expired in December 2018, and the NEU submitted a new charter of demands in March 2019. But two years later, management had still refused to meet with the union to continue collective bargaining.
In their quest to bust the union, management manipulated the appraisal system to be used in a punitive way against union members and even as a base for unfair dismissals. Management also informed newspapers about planned dismissals before informing workers and the union. Management in India also used the COVID-19 pandemic to enact mass dismissals, contrary to the public position of the Novartis’ chairman of the board.
The union tried all possible avenues to rebuild relations and trust, but management continued to disregard agreed protocols and honour the written agreements and understandings.

Around 1,400 striking National Health Mission (NHM) workers, including staff nurses, medical officers, homeopathy Ayurveda doctors and ministerial staff, were sacked by the Punjab government on 10 May 2021 for refusing to end their week-long strike.
About 3,000 NHM workers walked out on strike to demand higher wages and permanent jobs. The sacked workers, who were fired through the draconian Disaster Management Act, were from seven districts in Punjab.
In September 2020, over 30,000 NHM contract workers held a national stoppage over the same demands. Although many have had ten years’ service, they are paid meagre salaries and are denied entitlements available to regular government employees.

The draft rules on the scope of collective bargaining under the 2020 Industrial Relations Code were set out by the Ministry of Labour on 4 May 2021. The draft rules listed the matters which the negotiating union or negotiating council may negotiate with the employer, including grade classification, wages, allowances, bonuses and increments, as well as working hours and rest days. According to experts, it was the first time in the history of India’s labour legislation that an attempt had been made to set out the limits of collective bargaining between employers and trade unions.

The state government resorted to repressive measures against a strike by employees of the Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC), the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) reported in mid-April 2021. The union had been pressing for a wage revision for over a year before resorting to strike action.
In response, the government issued a prohibition order against the strike, threatened the strikers with victimisation and used private transport agencies to break the strike. No initiative was taken either by KSRTC management or the government to initiate discussions on the legitimate demands of the workers to resolve the long overdue periodic wage revision.

Several people were injured and hundreds detained after police used canes to attack a demonstration of unemployed teachers as they marched towards the Punjab chief minister’s residence in Patiala on 28 March 2021. Teachers held a sit-down protest near the residence, protesting that the government had not considered their demands, which are more than three years old.
The unemployed teachers, who have passed the Elementary Teacher in Training and the Teacher Eligibility Test, were demanding the repeal of the Bachelor of Education entry provision to elementary schools and for 10,000 new jobs to be immediately advertised. Elementary Teacher Training is a diploma-level course for teaching the preschool curriculum and equips teachers with the required skills.
In a similar incident, on 11 April unemployed teachers and multipurpose health workers, who were protesting jointly under an Unemployed Sanjha Morcha banner in Patiala, were cane-charged by the police after they tried to cross the police line in order to reach the chief minister’s residence.
On the same day, during another protest by unemployed teachers, the police cane- charged and injured at least ten union members near Baradari. The protestors moved their action to a main road near the Bhakhra Canal. According to the protestors, the police caught up with them, tried to overpower them, and two protesters were so frightened they jumped into the canal, but were later rescued.

On 10 November 2020, Toyota Kirloskar Motor Pvt. Ltd declared a lockout at its two plants in Bidadi industrial area after union members sat on strike in the factory premises for four days to protest the suspension of a worker. As a result, 39 members of the workers’ union for the car manufacturer have been suspended.
The union and management had engaged in talks to settle the dispute. As the union and its management were in a deadlock over the strike and the lockout following the suspension of 40 workers, the state government intervened, holding crisis talks. The following Tuesday, Karnataka state government banned the workers’ strike at Toyota Kirloskar Motor’s Bidadi plant and directed the management to lift the lockout so that production could resume soon.
The company offered to lift the lockout “subject to an assurance by the union that its member-workers will maintain normalcy and cordial relations in the factory to resume operations”, a conditional offer that was yet to be accepted by the union. Meanwhile, the 40 workers remained suspended.

Central trade unions in India came together in nationwide demonstrations on 23 September 2020 to protest against a series of anti-worker policies passed by the Modi government. The Modi government passed three key labour laws on the 22 and 23 of September through undemocratic means, fundamentally rewriting Indian labour laws. The laws include the Code on Industrial Relations, the Code on Social Security and the Code on Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions.
The legislation was passed in Parliament without debate as opposition parties were boycotting the house over legislation affecting agricultural workers and farmers. This lack of proper debate blatantly ignores the government’s own pre-legislative consultative guidelines.
A coalition of trade union centres, including the ITUC’s affiliates, have criticised many features of the new bills, noting three key faults. The Code on Social Security does not make social security a universal right, leaving millions of people without clear social protection. The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code excludes huge areas of the economy, including agriculture, which employs 50 per cent of the total working population of India. The Industrial Relations Code protects industry at the cost of working people, in violation of the constitution, by restricting the definition of worker and severely limiting the right to strike and the ability of working people to participate in a collective bargaining process.

Women workers at Gokaldas Exports have been fighting for their livelihoods for more than a month, as the garment factory owner illegally laid off 1,200 workers at its only unionised factory. On 8 June 2020, management announced a lay-off of all workers at the only factory with union membership.
Factories with more than 100 workers are required to obtain prior permission from the government before lay-offs, making the move illegal, as, at the time, 1,200 workers were employed in the factory. A sit-in at the gates of the factory began that same evening and continued for more than a month.
Furthermore, officials from Gokaldas Exports have gone to village after village, to where the workers live, bullying the workers to resign and threatening to withhold dues unless they resign. Union members, with support from village leaders, have managed to resist the pressure from management.
Gokaldas Exports, which owns 20 factories and produces clothes for H&M, have continually refused to engage in good faith with conciliation proceedings before the labour department or attend meetings called by the National Monitoring Committee (NMC), part of the global framework agreement between H&M and IndustriALL Global Union. Workers at Gokaldas earn less than US$4.5 a day.

On 8 January 2020, ten Indian trade unions organised the largest strike in the world with over 250 million workers protesting the current economic and social policies of Narendra Modi’s government, accused of being overly focused on privatisation and not very attentive to employment and growth.

The manufacturing sector protests against the privatisation of public companies and policies that do not support employment. Among the requests: minimum wage, pension reform, labour reform.

The transport sector, the banking sector and the coal industry are striking in force. There are approximately 220 billion bank transactions at risk, including those in current and cash accounts. According to the unions, at least 500 thousand employees of the banks will cross their arms, along with another 600 thousand employees in coal mining.

Labour unions complain of central government indifference, which would have ignored their “12-point charter”. The demands from the service sector and the production sector include a minimum monthly wage at 21 thousand rupees (262 euros); job creation; the withdrawal of contractual policies of the workforce; discussions at various levels on labour reform; no to the privatisation of public sector industries; and, finally, a universal pension system.

India is in a critical moment given the slowdown in economic development, with stagnation in the employment sector and widespread unemployment in all sections of the population, which reached 7.7% in December. According to the latest forecasts released yesterday, growth should reach 5% in the current fiscal year, the lowest level in 11 years.

For the Centre of Indian Trade Unions, one of the striking organisations, “the government has failed to tackle the economic crisis. At the same time, it is committed to privatising and selling public sector properties, natural resources and other national assets. All this detracts from the national interest and the country’s development."

Chennai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (CMRL) dismissed eight workers on 26 April 2019 for protesting against outsourcing. The CMRL Employees’ Union had written to the CMRL management against the company’s heavy use of contract labour in November 2018. A. Soundararajan, state president of the Centre for Indian Trade Unions (CITU) who is also the honorary president of the union, had signed the letter. The dismissed employees were office bearers of the CMRL Employees’ Union affiliated to CITU.

On 29 April the workers staged a sit-in protest against the dismissals of the eight union office bearers. This was followed by a two-day strike in which the permanent workers raised several issues including cuts in their allowances, increased outsourcing and the reinstatement of their unfairly dismissed colleagues. The strike ended on 1 May following an assurance from the management that an appeal against the dismissals would be considered, and that no one would be victimised for their part in the strike.

Promises of no victimisation did not hold true. Three workers were suspended during the strike, on 1 May. They were accused initially of sabotaging the signalling system, but this later changed to abandoning duty. A further six workers were suspended after the strike.

Moreover, the dismissed workers did not hear anything about their appeal. Instead they received letters asking them to vacate their company accommodation.

The case was supposed to have been taken up first by the State Labour Department, then the Central Labour Department, but owing to confusion over who has jurisdiction over the case, it was not dealt with, and by the end of the year, the case of the eight dismissed workers had still not been settled.

In the name of rationalising industrial relations laws, the Modi government is levelling down workers’ rights and institutionalising poverty pay, all in the interests of multinational enterprises. The Indian labour law reforms are wide-ranging and will significantly affect economic and social policy. They cover industrial relations, wages, social security, welfare, labour inspections, trade unions, and special economic zones.

The reforms are consolidating some forty-four Central labour laws into four labour codes covering the following: Labour Code on Industrial Relations, Labour Code on Wages, Labour Code on Social Security, and Labour Code on Occupational Health Safety and Working Conditions.

They include the adoption of a range of flexible labour market practices that weaken and undermine unions, remove regulatory burden on harmful business conduct, disempower the individual worker and weaken social cohesion and mutual responsibility at the workplace. This is done by replacing predicable and long-term employment contracts with fixed-term, flexible, temporary contract labour and other categories of precarious work; engaging in practices that prefer workers’ committees over trade unions; and turning a blind eye to employers who engage in anti-union practices including failing to recognise and negotiate with representative trade unions.

With these changes, the government is notably aiming at an improved rating on the World Bank’s discredited Doing Business ranking to catalyse an increase in private sector investments.

Following mass protests since the beginning of 2019 against Modi’s proposals, Indian unions have responded with unprecedented unity to the new government’s plans. The ten union confederations in the Trade Union Co-ordinating Council – including the ITUC affiliates INTUC, HMS, SEWA and other confederations and independent unions – marched again on 2 August saying that they “take strong objection and condemn bulldozing of codification of labour laws and other laws in spite of strong objections from the trade union movement.”

So far, the Indian government has failed to meaningfully consult social partners, especially workers’ unions, on the ongoing labour law reforms. In a couple of meetings called to engage on the draft bills, the meetings were unsuccessful for lack of good faith on the side of the government. The central trade unions have complained that outside the aborted meeting of the 2015 Labour Conference, no genuine, meaningful and comprehensively planned consultations have taken place at the Central level. In 2017 and 2018, an agenda was adopted by the Standing Labour Committee for a meeting of the India Labour Conference, which was unilaterally cancelled by the prime minister. The situation is worse at the state level, where there are no tripartite consultations. Industry-level consultations at the state level are alleged to be compromised because, among other concerns, the state governments unilaterally nominate workers’ representatives and typically do so on a political basis and without reference to ILO standards.

As well as calling for the proposals to be withdrawn and a higher national minimum wage, the unions are calling for a halt to privatisation and for the creation of more and better jobs by increasing demand in the economy through higher pay, rather than attracting multinational enterprises by slashing labour protections.

Thousands of contract workers from the Tamil Nadu Electricity Generation and Distribution Corporation (TANGEDCO) were arrested in nine regions across the state on 10 October. The protesting workers were demanding a fixed minimum wage for contract workers, permanent contracts for around 43,000 existing vacancies, the payment of bonuses to contract workers on a par with regular employees and a roll-back of the steep hike in charges for new electricity connections. The protest was led by the Central Organisation of Tamil Nadu Electricity Employees (COTEE) affiliated to the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU).

Over 10,000 contract workers in TANGEDCO had been working for more than 10 years in various capacities, including electricity generation and maintenance, and wanted their status to be regularised.

No progress was made, and the workers began an indefinite strike on 1 November. On 5 November, police arrested 142 workers who staged a picket in front of the TANGEDCO office. They were kept in a hall and released in the evening.

The Telangana government announced on 6 October 2019 the dismissal of 48,000 employees of the Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) after they launched an indefinite strike demanding solutions to their long-pending problems.

Some 1,200 employees remained, including those who did not join the strike and others who returned to their duties before 6 pm on 5 October, a deadline fixed by the government for the unions to call off their strike.

The workers had been on strike following a call by the Joint Action Committee (JAC) of Telangana RTC employees’ and workers’ unions in the early hours of 5 October.

The workers’ demands included a merger of the TSRTC with the state government, as was done in the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, where they were treated as government employees with their retirement age being changed to 60 years.

They were also demanding a revision of their salaries, pending since April 2017, and fresh recruitment in the corporation to reduce the workload on employees.

The chief minister also categorically ruled out a merger of TSRTC with the state government. He announced that the government would start the exercise soon to recruit new staff.

A week later the chief minister said he would be open to the TSRTC workers returning to their jobs, but only if they agreed to waive their right to union representation and give an undertaking that “they would not join any employees’ union.”

Protests continued, and police detained activists during a day-long shutdown on 19 October. The chief minister still refused to accede to the workers’ principal demand, a merger with the government that would ensure greater job security. Instead, he threatened to privatise the whole service.

Over two hundred striking workers from Motherson Automotive Technologies & Engineering (MATE), located at Sriperumbudur, an industrial hub 40 kilometres from Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu, were arrested by the police on 24 September when they staged a protest rally in front of the Deputy Labour Commissioner (DLC) office in Irunkatukotai.

About 500 permanent Motherson autoworkers had been on strike for more than a month to demand recognition of their newly formed trade union – Chengai Anna Mavatta Jana Nayaga Thozhilalar Sangam (CAMJNTS) – as well as a wage rise and an end to harsh working conditions.

When protesting teachers attempted to enter West Bengal’s state education department’s headquarters on 24 June, they were baton-charged by the police, who arrested several of them. The

primary teachers were there to present their demands for a pay rise, having had their wages frozen for the last eight years. A similar incident occurred on 17 August when the West Bengal police baton charged to disperse para teachers who were on a hunger strike near the Kalyani bus terminus and Kalyani rail station in the Nadia district. The para teachers had gathered from different districts to demand a salary hike and upgrade their status as permanent teachers.

When workers at the Motherson car parts company joined the Chengai Anna Mavatta Jana Nayaga Thozhilalar Sangam (CAMJNTS) union, management responded by demanding all workers sign an anti-union bond. Motherson is one of the largest car components makers in India with a total of 11 factories.

Workers with eight years’ service are only paid 9,000–10,000 rupees (US$128–US$142) per month and do not receive proper benefits. There are no proper transportation and canteen facilities at the Chennai plants. Night shift workers are not provided with proper meals and only receive snacks.

The workers formed their union with the aim of negotiating improved wages and conditions. They held a sit-down protest on 31 July and 1 August 2019 against coercive management tactics to stop workers unionising.

The protests ended and work resumed after two days when management withdrew its anti-union employment bond.

On the night of Sunday 19 May 2019, striking workers and trade union leaders from Chowel India Limited, an auto-parts manufacturing company in Sriperumputhur near Chennai, were arrested. The workers, affiliated to the Centre of Indian Trade Unions, had been holding a sit-in since 14 May over delayed wage payments.

The midnight arrest took place when the workers and trade union leaders stepped up their protest against the move by a supplier to the company to seize the machinery for non-payment, fearing they would no longer have a job if the equipment was moved. The protest was organised by the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), whose district president S. Kannan and secretary E. Muthu Kumar were manhandled and arrested by the police along with 149 protesting workers.

Further arrests followed on 12 July when former employees of Chowel India and Dongsun plants protested outside the Hyundai India company in Chennai. The workers were attempting to present a petition over the closure of the two companies, which are subsidiaries of the automotive giant Hyundai. About 150 workers, along with CITU Kanchipuram district leaders, were arrested by police but later released.

Management of Chowel India and Dongsun had responded to increasing workers’ opposition over the violation of their rights by closing down the plants and relocating the machinery to another Hyundai subsidiary called Hwashin Automotive India.

Around 100 employees of the government-run Puducherry Agro Service and Industries Corporation Ltd. (PASIC) were arrested on Wednesday 10 July 2019 after they blocked traffic at the Rajiv Gandhi Square demanding immediate payment of pending salaries. The workers had been staging protests and pickets since 26 June in support of their charter of demands. Management had not fully paid employees, including voucher-based and daily-rated workers, for the past 57 months in violation of India’s labour laws.

Asahi Glass, which makes windshields for major car companies, refused to recognise the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) union when it took over representation of their workers to help them in their dispute with management. The company had dismissed 28 workers in October 2018 for their part in a strike over a wage dispute. Since that time, the company had arbitrarily denied workers their leave and changed shifts so that they often had to work seven days a week. After some of the workers joined CITU, management suspended six employees, including an office-bearer of the union. On 5 February 2019, CITU demanded the unconditional reinstatement of all 28 workers. No progress was made in negotiations, and on 5 March the union issued a notice warning of an indefinite strike from 25 March. The strike lasted 87 days before conciliation led to an agreement. Management had

still not reinstated the 28 dismissed strikers but did agree to continue discussions and come to a resolution in three to six months. It also agreed to withdraw the suspension of six workers and reinstate those workers immediately, as well as to negotiate over wage increments and other benefits.

On 11 February 2019, the Pricol car parts company in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, dismissed 294 workers for their part in a 100-day-long strike. The workers, who are part of the union Kovai Manila Pricol Thozhilalargal Otrumai Sangam (KMPTOS), affiliated to All India Central Council of Trade Union (AICCTU), had been protesting against the repressive policies of management. The strike ended in December 2018 after management agreed to follow up on the Labour Department’s instructions, such as settling profit shares owed and bonuses, paying pending allowances and assuring strikers that there would be no victimisation. When they returned to work , however, 302 workers who had been active in the protest received transfer orders to Andhra Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Maharashtra. Management claimed it was necessary due to the severe losses caused by the strike and gave the workers just three weeks to relocate.

However, 294 workers refused to accept the transfer orders and were subsequently dismissed from service on 11 February 2019. The dismissal came at a time when the reconciliation talks were pending, and according to KMPTOS, only the members of their union were victimised. KMPTOS also said the workers were deprived of their bonuses and their share in the profits, contrary to the agreement.

The case went to court, and on 6 March the Madras High Court ordered the company to reinstate all the dismissed workers. The company ignored the court order, however, and on 30 May 2019 the workers held a huge protest demonstration. The dispute continued.

Delivery workers employed by the food delivery service Swiggy in Kochi were being forced to resign for organising a protest. On 29 May 2019, workers protested against a new pay scale that Swiggy had put into place without prior notice and which drastically reduced their earnings. A few days later Swiggy threatened to withhold weekly payments from those who initiated the protest unless they submitted their resignation.

About 200 delivery workers went on strike in protest against not only the change in the pay scale, but also other issues such as the reduction in the waiting charge, and new criteria for monthly and weekly incentives. Sources from Swiggy confirmed that some of the delivery partners were suspended from service.

There were various reports of police repression during the All India Worker’s Strike on 8 and 9 January 2019. One of the more detailed reports concerns workers from the Daikin Air Conditioning Mazdoor Union based in the Neemrana industrial area. It appeared to be part of the Daikin company’s repression of its workers’ union.
At around 2 p.m. on 8 January 2019, when the workers’ rally reached the Daikin company gates, the police lathi-charged workers and also deployed rubber bullets, tear gas and water cannons against them, grievously wounding 40 workers, with many people requiring hospitalisation for fractures and head injuries.
During the night of 8 to 9 January, 14 workers were taken from their homes into police custody. The 14 workers arrested were Mahesh Kumar, from Jhunjhunu; Ghanshyam Saini, from Alwar; Surendar Kumar, from Himachal Pradesh (HP); Jagdev, HP; Ajay Kumar HP; Sukh Ram, HP; Avinash Chandra, HP; Praveen Kumar, HP; Pankaj Chaudhary, HP; Ranjeet Kumar, HP; Sujit, HP; Deep Singh, UP; Ajay Thakur, from Orissa; and Lal Chand, Orissa.
The workers felt that they had been targeted as a result of their continued attempts to win union recognition at Daikin. The first attempt at forming the union was in 2013, but owing to management resistance, it was not registered until 29 August 2018, and only then thanks to intervention by the Rajasthan High Court. Management still refused to recognise the union or negotiate with the office bearers, and transferred 15 workers into various other service locations. Since 2013 about 50 permanent workers have been sacked and countless more contract workers in the struggle to register the union. The struggle has continued and on two occasions when the union tried to hoist the union flag, it was forcefully removed by the factory’s security personnel.

On 8 and 9 January 2019, 150 million Indian workers took part in what was reported to be the biggest work stoppage in history. Ten trade union centres and several independent federations joined together for the historic general strike that involved workers in manufacturing, mining, energy, transportation, banking, public services, construction, agriculture and other sectors.
The workers were protesting against the serious deterioration in working conditions, price rises and job shortages. The trade unions objected in particular to the proposed amendments to the Trade Union Act, 1926, which sought to statutorily recognise unions but only at the government’s discretion, undermining the independent functioning of unions.
The ten central trade unions also accused the government of ignoring their 12-point Charter of Demands on the labour code, minimum wage, universal social security, etc. They urged the government to engage in genuine consultation with unions over the reform of labour law and to ratify ILO Conventions 87 and 98.
It was reported after the strike – which itself led to a few violent clashes and arrests – that some workers faced a backlash for their participation. The Centre of Indian Trade Union (CITU) said that contractual workers and workers from the unorganised sector who participated in the strike were not being allowed to go back to work, and were being forced to hand in their factory gate passes.

In a report to the ITUC sent at the end of 2018, the National Union of Seafarers of India (NUSI) highlighted several obstacles to the exercise of trade union rights that still persist. It noted in particular widespread employer resistance to trade unions, the tendency to favour yellow unions, and discrimination against union activists. It also flagged up strong employer resistance to collective bargaining, especially if it involved better working conditions, and what it described as “tremendous challenges” facing those trying to organise trade unions in export processing zones, particularly in the manufacturing, logistics and service industries. NUSI had to battle hard with the government over its provident fund, and said that activists had faced arrest during the struggle.
Similarly, the national centre Hind Mazdoor Sabha (HMS) stated that violations of trade union rights, namely the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining, were very common. Trade unionists are being harassed, it said, victimised, threatened, physically assaulted, tortured mentally and physically, faced with serious criminal charges, arrested, and sometimes sentenced. Employers often refuse to bargain. Even when they do bargain, the employer often backs out from the agreement. Strikes are almost always prohibited and workers are forced to terminate their strikes. In the unorganised sector, there is very little scope of bargaining. The HMS also agreed with NUSI that employers favoured yellow unions.

Sanitation workers employed by the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) were met with a lathi charge, in which several workers were injured, as they headed for a sit-in protest on 8 October 2018. Several required hospital treatment.
The workers had been on strike since September 12 over pay and contracts. Seventy-one were suspended for their strike action.
Sanjay Gehlot, president of the MCD Swachhata Karamchari Union, explained that they were striking for temporary workers to be made permanent, for salaries to be paid on time, to get their pensions on time, and for medical assistance. Another worker added that despite the health risks involved in their work, they had no medical insurance, and that they were often not paid on time. After years of protesting and false promises, they had decided to hold an indefinite strike.
The 28-day strike was called off on 9 October after the East Delhi Municipal Corporation agreed to their demands, notably the regularisation of jobs.

Some 3,000 Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA) and Urban Social Health Activists (USHA) employed by the Madhya Pradesh government were set upon by police officers, who beat them with lathis as they gathered in Bhopal on 3 October 2018 to demand a fixed minimum salary for their work.
The workers had come to Bhopal from 16 districts across the state. As they got to about 200 metres from the chief minister’s residence, they were set upon by the police, armed with lathis. The police officers prevented them from going any further, and forced over 100 of the workers into police vans and drove them to the Central Jail, including a five-year-old boy.
ASHA and USHA workers in Madhya Pradesh had been protesting since April 2018. The chief minister had reportedly promised to address their demands on an earlier occasion. Their main demand concerned pay, as the national statutory minimum wage of Rs 18,000 per month was not applied to them. They were demanding Rs 10,000 per month for ASHA-USHA workers and Rs 25,000 per month for ASHA “sahayoginis”, who monitor and coordinate the health services provided by ASHA workers in an area. They were also calling for a travel allowance, as their work involved extensive travel in the field, and they were affected by rising petrol prices.
Chief Minister Chouhan did not meet the protesting workers, nor acknowledge their demands.

Over 150 workers from Myougn Shin India were arrested on 27 September 2018 as they gathered for a peaceful protest in front of the Korean Consulate in Chennai. The workers had been on strike since 6 September, demanding a negotiated wage agreement with an adequate pay rise. In spite of numerous attempts at conciliation through the tripartite process, the company has refused to agree to negotiations. Instead, it attempted to force through a unilateral wage settlement that the workers refused to accept.
The workers began assembling near the consulate around 10 a.m. and were quickly marshalled into a corner over 250 metres away from the consulate by the police. The police assembled in force and refused to allow the workers to leave the barricaded area. Workers representatives explained they merely wished to petition the Korean government through the consulate, but the police would not let them through. About 11 a.m., the workers were loaded on to vans and driven away to a nearby marriage hall.
In the marriage hall, the police refused to give water to the protesting workers, causing one of the workers to faint and be admitted to a hospital emergency ward. The workers were later allowed to leave the hall and in the evening rallied in protest outside the hospital. They dispersed after the police gave an oral apology.

Yamaha India Pvt Ltd summarily dismissed two workers for participating in union activities on 21 September 2018. The workers had registered a union with the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) and had submitted a charter of demands. They had notified management of an industrial dispute on 10 September and conciliation proceedings were underway.
The dismissed workers were union office bearers, and had requested permission to attend a conciliation meeting called by the Labour Department. Yahama denied permission despite a process for taking two hours off every month for personal reasons. The workers took their two hours to go to the conciliation meeting, which management failed to attend. When they reported to work on Friday 21 September, they found that their access cards had been revoked.
Colleagues of the dismissed workers called a strike in protest. Management reportedly sent security guards to the homes of the eight union representatives and threatened that the workers would be dismissed if they did not end the strike. Management also accused a worker of stealing and absconding. The management did not appear at a conciliation meeting called by the Labour Department on 23 September.

The Haryana government invoked the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) for six months on 30 August barring transport workers from going on strike to protest against the state government’s decision to privatise bus services, a move they feared would lead to reduced wages, lesser job security and increased fares.
The Haryana Roadways Workers’ Joint Action Committee said it had remained open for talks up until the end but the government had been inflexible. The two-day strike went ahead on 4 and 5 September. During the strike police lathi-charged protesters, and 164 were arrested. One hundred ten were sent to the judicial custody, while 12 were remanded in police custody. The state government suspended 122 employees with immediate effect, including the union’s office bearers.
Charges were brought against 23 Haryana Roadways employees, including union leaders, for disrupting bus services at the city depot under the terms of the Haryana Essential Services Maintenance Act.

Hundreds of midday meal workers, who prepare lunches at government-funded schools, were arrested by police on 6 August 2018 after they attempted to hold a protest in Vijayawada, the capital region of Andhra Pradesh state.
About 3,000 midday meal workers travelled to the city to demand the government pay outstanding monthly salaries and cancel plans to privatise midday meal services throughout the state.
Dozens of police vans were used to transport the arrested women to cells in police stations around the densely populated city.
The workers were members of the Mid-Day Meals Scheme Workers Union, which is affiliated to the Centre for Indian Trade Unions (CITU). Workers feared that over 80,000 jobs would be destroyed if the privatisation plans were adopted.
During a similar protest on 30 July, many women mid-day meal workers who tried to march on a state minister’s home to protest the proposed privatisation were injured during a lathi charge by the police. Around 3,000 workers took part in the protest, and many were arrested including leaders of the Mid-Day Meal Scheme Workers Union, namely the union’s state president and secretary G. Varalakshmi and K. Swarupa Rani respectively, district president K. Prasanna, honorary president S. Aruna, and district leaders from the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), G. Koteswara Rao and RKSV Kumar.

Telangana Northern Power Discom (TSNPDCL) issued an official notice on 24 July 2018 asking its officials to terminate the services of contract and outsourced workers if they took part in a strike.
Over 10,000 electricity contract employees were on the fourth day of an indefinite strike to demand regular employment contracts. Represented by the Telangana Vidyut Karmika Sangham (TVKS) union, they were also calling for the payment of the minimum wage, together with employees’ state insurance and provident fund contributions.

Police arrested over 580 Tamil Nadu Rubber Corporation workers on 23 July 2018 as they protested outside the corporation office and blocked traffic on the road.
Over 1,700 contract workers are employed by the state government-owned rubber estates. They were only being paid 442 rupees (US$6) per day for between 200 and 210 days a year or an average 13,950 rupees per month. The trade unions had called for an increase to 18,000 rupees.
Over 30 tripartite meetings, involving the rubber workers’ trade unions, the Tamil Nadu Rubber Corporation and the state government, had been held since 2016 when the talks began. The Tamil Nadu state government was only offering a 23-rupee daily increase.
All those arrested were released later that evening.

In June 2018 the Washington-based Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) issued a report revealing a campaign of vicious repression to prevent workers at Shahi Exports from forming a union and organising to call for better pay and conditions.
Shahi Exports is India’s largest clothing exporter, making clothes for top brands such as H&M and Benetton. In March 2018 several union supporters circulated a petition that asked management to provide cleaner water and increase pay. Shahi managers responded by making death threats to several pro-union workers and telling other employees to beat them.
The WRC said its investigators had interviewed more than 30 workers at Shahi’s “Unit 8” factory in Bangalore. It found that eight managers were responsible for violence and death threats and that 15 pro-union workers had been suspended.
Several managers had called union supporters into their office, berated them and then directed other employees to beat them. One manager urged other workers to beat a woman union supporter, with one nearly strangling her. A second manager lashed out at another female union supporter and told other employees: “These whores are trying to close the factory. Beat her and kill her.” That worker was then beaten and had her clothes torn and her necklace, mobile phone and handbag stolen.
The pressure from the WRC and the response of Shahi’s Western clients, notably following the adverse publicity caused by the publication of the WRC report, led to an announcement by Shahi in July that it was dismissing the managers concerned. Shahi also reinstated the 15 workers, paid them back pay and agreed to recognise and negotiate with the union, the Karnataka Garment Workers’ Union.

On 29 June 2018, the Delhi High Court approved a petition filed by the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to prevent its 9,000-strong workforce of non-executive employees — train operators, maintenance staff, station controllers, technicians — from going on strike, on the grounds that commuters would be “greatly inconvenienced”.
The commuters themselves, however, sided with the metro workers. The Delhi Metro Commuters’ Association (DMCA) issued a statement on 30 June in support of the DMRC workers, who had been protesting for the past ten days for better pay and the right to form a union.
The rail corporation claimed it had reached a settlement with the staff council in July 2017. But the employees, who had been holding sit-ins at different metro stations for several days over their unmet demands, pointed out that DMRC had failed to meet the terms of that settlement.

The Luminous Power Technologies Workers Union was formed on 26 March 2018 as workers sought to defend themselves against increasing violations of their rights, poor working conditions and occupational health and safety issues. Luminous Power Technologies, based in Himachal Pradesh state, is owned by Schneider Electric, a global specialist in energy management.
The union completed all the processes required for union registration. As soon as the management learnt of the workers’ steps to form the union, however, it set off a train of union-busting activities including threatening union committee members and changing the work shifts of all union office bearers in order to isolate them and undermine their ability to meet other union members at the workplace.
The management then took it one step further, transferring all 12 office bearers to the Hosur Tamilnadu plant, more than 2,800 kilometres away, just before the initiation of the trade union verification process by the labour administration.
Workers reported that some managers of Luminous Power Technologies used abusive language based on the caste of the union office bearers in order to humiliate them and denigrate the union in front of other workers and restrain them from joining the union.
The workers filed a police complaint against the abusive managers, and held a rally on 9 June 2018 demanding the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining, as well as an end to the harassment of union office bearers.

Six hundred protesting government nurses were arrested by police in Rajpur, the capital of Chhattisgarh state, on 2 June 2018. The nurses had been taking industrial action over the previous two weeks to demand a review of their pay scale.
Two days before the arrests, Chhattisgarh’s state government outlawed the strike under the terms of the draconian Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA). The nurses were arrested for defying the court order.
The government nurses, who only received 3,500 rupees (US$52) per month, wanted their wages increased to 4,600 rupees. While other government employees were paid according to 7^th Pay Commission recommendations, the state government nurses received less than the 6^th Pay Commission.
The nurses were released shortly after their arrest, and called off their strike on 4 June, following assurances from the state government that their demands would be met.

The Haryana Breweries Limited Mazdoor Union (HBLM) faced escalating attacks on union members as management persistently refused to enter into good faith negotiations for a collective bargaining agreement. In February 2018 the union began round-the-clock protests at the factory gate in support of the workers’ right to union recognition and collective bargaining.
On 8 March 2018, management dismissed union president Anil Kumar Saini after he used compensatory leave to attend an AB InBev unions meeting organised by the International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF). He had accumulated the leave after being compelled to work 16 hours continuously on a public holiday.
On 28 April there was what the IUF described as a “management-orchestrated physical attack” on the workers’ peaceful protest outside a Sonepat government office in which a union committee member was seriously injured. A police complaint for alleged assault was then filed against union members, which resulted in the arrest of the union leadership. The arrested leaders were released on bail while the dispute and the protests continued.

On 27 December 2017 the Jharkhand State BJP government banned Mazdoor Sangathan Samiti (MSS), a 30-year-old union representing informal sector workers, under the Criminal Law Amendment Act (CLAA). It also filed cases under the same act against ten MSS office bearers on what the union described as false charges.
The ban came after the MSS invited Varvara Rao, a renowned Telugu poet, to speak on the 100^th anniversary of the Russian revolution. The government concluded that this proved the MSS was affiliated to the Maoist party and therefore banned it. It also accused the MSS of “illegally raising funds” for organising the programme.
The MSS was established in 1985 and was registered in 1989. By 2017 it had 22,000 members, all in the informal sector. The MSS had been organising workers in the coal mines of Dhanbad, thermal power plant workers, agricultural workers as well as workers on the Shikharji pilgrimage site. The union runs a hospital in Jharkhand which is free of cost for all the workers and tribal groups in the area and publishes a monthly newspaper for the workers. Through its work in the informal sector, the MSS has been at the forefront of many of the struggles of tribal groups and workers for over three decades.
MSS has also played a leading role in opposing the so-called “momentum Jharkhand programme” which effectively displaces tribal groups and destroys their livelihood by depriving them of natural resources in the name of development.
The MSS believes it is this work and the government’s known aversion to militant trade unions that was the real reason behind the ban.

The Haryana State Health Department terminated the contracts of about 500 contractual employees on 9 December for going on strike.
The contract staff took action to demand regular employment in the state health department like the employees who were regularised in 2012 and 2013. According to the Health Department, they had failed to follow an order to return to work after 24 hours, which is why they were sacked. However, the health department had already issued an order on Friday 8 December directing directed civil surgeons to sack those participating in the protest.

In October 2017, workers at SPM Autocomp Systems Pvt. Limited, a manufacturer and supplier of auto parts, in Manesar, Gurugram district, Haryana State, accused the company’s management of harassing them and issuing veiled threats to their families to deter them from forming a trade union. Complaints to the Labour Commissioner and the police were of no avail.

The workers decided to form a union after a colleague was killed in April 2017 after being caught in the conveyer belt while on duty. But management began to harass the office bearers of the union soon after they initiated the process for its registration in September. One of the union officials reported that members of management even went to the houses of the union office bearers and issued veiled threats.

The union president, Ravinder, claimed that he, along with a half-a-dozen office-bearers, was held hostage on 9 October inside the company, beaten up and forced to sign papers to reach an agreement with the company on union formation. The firm also got villagers to threaten them and barred them from entering the company’s premises since 10 October.

The workers’ lawyer noted the following: “Workers in most companies in Gurugram face harassment for forming a union. The fact that only 100-odd companies, out of several thousands of factories, in Gurugram have trade unions speaks volumes of the state of affairs”.

On 22 September 2017, workers and their families from Tayo Rolls, a Tata Steel subsidiary, were brutally beaten up by the police while peacefully protesting in front of the gates of the steel plant in Jamshedpur.
They were protesting against the company’s closure, demanding alternative employment or appropriate compensation, when they were beaten up by a group of police officers, who also used water cannon. About 40 protestors were injured in the attack. Police also filed trumped-up charges against many workers.
The workers demands included the payment of pending wages, alternative employment for workers in other TATA companies or, if no alternative employment could be offered, payment of compensation of 100 months’ basic wages and an allowance for the cost of living adjustment, as provided after the closure of a similar unit belonging to the same group of companies a few years earlier. The company had offered a voluntary separation scheme (VSS), but about 284 regular workers did not accept it, arguing that it was insufficient.
The workers had challenged the closure, and filed a petition to the Labour, Employment and Training Department, arguing that the corrupt practices of company officials had led to company losses, and that the company should be revived and employment should be provided to all workers. As the company was a subsidiary of TATA steel, there was capacity to provide alternative employment to workers in other units.
In October 2016, the Jharkhand Labour Department rejected the closure application, but the company stopped paying wages that month.
In June 2017, workers filed a case in labour court, seeking the court to direct the company to pay wages. Meanwhile, the company appealed to the high court regarding the closure.

Nearly 2,200 employees of various Madras government departments were arrested and removed by the police after they picketed the Tirupur Collectorate on 12 September 2017 to press their demands for wage revision and better social security, among other issues. The protest was carried out as part of the indefinite strike that had been observed by the government employees affiliated to Joint Action Council of Tamil Nadu Teachers Organisation- Government Employees Organisations (JACTTO-GEO).

In June 2017, the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) applied for the registration of a company-level trade union in M/s TATA Advanced Systems Ltd. Adibatla, an aerospace manufacturing industry. The government denied registration to the union while on 15 August 2017, the police arrested eleven union office bearers and active members of the union for demonstrating. According to the police, this demonstration was banned under section 144 of the Code of criminal procedure which prohibits gatherings of more than four people.

When the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) organised workers at JK Tyres Factory near Manimangalam, Kanchipuram District, Tamil Nadu, in May 2017, management responded by setting up an in-house union.

A CITU official, Muthukumar, said that some permanent workers belonging to CITU were intimidated into joining the internal union and made office bearers. Management also targeted active leaders in CITU through suspensions and internal department transfers. The workers had decided to join CITU to address grievances ranging from low wages to production pressure and lack of amenities at the shop floor.

Over 600 workers went on strike on 24 July to demand recognition of their union. On 2 August, one week into the strike, management declared the workers’ strike illegal, as industries in the automobile sector have been termed a public utility service. They threatened disciplinary action and over 27 workers were terminated, citing “unsatisfactory performance”.

The workers continued their action and increased the exposure of the strike by conducting protests in front of the Kanchipuram District Collectorate and in other parts of the District.

After a 17-day strike, the management agreed to negotiate with the majority union and reinstate the 27 workers dismissed during the strike.

On July 21, the Punjab State government issued a draft notification disbanding truck operator unions.

The truck unions were banned under the Punjab Goods Carriages (Regulation and Prevention of Cartelisation Rules) Act, 2017. The government had claimed the decision was taken to end the mafia of goods transporters who had monopolised the truck business using political influence and were obstructing the free and fair movement of goods transport.

At the end of April 2017 management at Pricol Pvt Ltd, an automobile-components manufacturing unit, in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, deducted eight days wages after workers went on strike in support of farmers for one day, on 25 April, as part of a series of solidarity actions to bring the farmers’ plight to the attention of the government.

According to the collective agreement at the factory, a strike can be compensated for by working an alternate day. When the strike notice was posted on 19 April, however, management refused to hold discussions about an alternate date, and put up a notice saying that wages would be deducted as punishment for anyone who participated in the strike.
The workers’ representatives said that workers are continually harassed by management to discourage unionisation, or transferred for being in the union: nearly 250 workers have been transferred to other units. All of them are above the age of 50, and have worked for more than 20 years.

On 29 June over 120 activists from a number of associations including the All India Central Council of Trade Unions, the DAA (Democratic Advocates Association) and the AIARLA (All India Agricultural Rural Labourers Association) staged a protest outside the State Secretariat demanding justice for the Pricol workers. They were arrested and briefly held in detention but released later that evening.

Management threatened to move the factory from Coimbatore if the protests continued. More protests did follow, however, including a 16-day hunger fast. On 5 July the State government issued a Government Order questioning the management’s decision to withhold eight days wages for a one-day strike, and referred the matter to the labour court.

About 60 leaders and workers from the Singareni Collieries Company Limited were arrested in the Ramagundem area on 16 June 2017 when they tried to stage a strike called by five major trade unions – INTUC, CITU, AITUC, HMS and BMS – after talks over fulfilling failed promises to restore the Dependent Employment Scheme (DES) broke down . Another 30 were arrested in Khammam while further arrests were reported in Adilabad.

Singareni Collieries operates 30 underground mines and 16 opencast projects with a total workforce of 56,000, spread across the vast Godavari valley coalfield in Telangana State. The aim of the DES was to offer jobs to dependents of its employees who opt for voluntary retirement due to ill health. There had been four rounds of talks before the unions issued their strike notice on 31 March, well in advance of the start of their action. The arrests were made on the grounds of illegal assembly under section 144 of the Criminal Procedures Code which allows the authorities to declare any gathering of more than four people illegal. Yet the strike was legal, having followed proper procedures, the unions pointed out, and the arrests unjustified.

The strike was suspended on 24 June for further talks.

One hundred fifteen mid-day meal workers, all members of the Noon Meal Scheme Workers’ Union, were arrested on 19 June 2017 when they gathered outside the Collector’s office in Srikakulam, Andrah Pradesh, to protest against delays in the payment of their wages and the denial of access to rights such as the Employees State Insurance scheme and the Provident Fund. They had not been paid since December 2016.

The State government had cut the allocation of funds for the noon meal scheme, which had been designed to cut dropout rates in schools, and had entrusted running of some of the noon meal centres to private players and non-governmental organisations.

On 31 May, Haryana police lathi-charged, arrested and detained over 400 workers, including 35 women, at the Japanese owned Aisin Automative Ltd’s plant in IMT, Rohtak.
The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) said the incident took place during a march in solidarity with Aisin workers who had been conducting a peaceful protest following the termination of 20 workers. Several workers were injured in the lathi charge.
“Aisin workers took the initiative to form a trade union and submitted their application to the state labour department. But the labour department of the BJP-led government in Haryana rejected the application without stating any reason and almost simultaneously, on 3 May 2017, the management of AISIN Automotive terminated the service of the 20 leading workers, including four women, without notice or giving any reason,” said the statement issued by Tapan Sen, general secretary of CITU.
Sen further reported that following the protests, the remaining 700 Aisin workers were also sent out of the factory, and were “directed” to return to work only after giving a written undertaking not to join any union.
CITU called for the immediate release of all workers and bilateral talks to sort out issues raised by workers.

On 22 May 2017, workers at BASF India’s Mangalore plant began a peaceful protest calling on the company to stop anti-union discrimination and start complying with its own code of conduct, IndustriALL reported.

BASF had adopted a code of conduct binding all employees of the BASF group worldwide that incorporates globally applicable standards of conduct including human rights, and labour and social standards.

At BASF’s Mangalore plant, however, employees are discriminated against. Non-union employees who perform similar tasks to union employees are promoted to posts with higher salaries, better employment benefits and fewer working hours, encouraging workers to disassociate themselves from union membership.

Over time, management’s anti-union strategies led to a reduction of employees under the worker category from 138 to 78. If a worker demands their rights, they are issued false warning letters.

Following various accidents at the plant, the local branch of BASF India Worker’s Federation called for transparency and consultation on the details of the accidents and remedial measures taken by the management. Requests for information were refused by management.

Union members were also concerned about the recruitment of large numbers of causal and daily hire migrant workers in the production department, where hazardous chemicals are used. The union called on the company to stop deployment of short-term precarious workers in dangerous work and demanded the company recruit more permanent workers.

BASF workers in other plants located in Thane (Mumbai) and Ankleshwar (Gujarat) also raised similar issues and called on the BASF management to comply with the code of conduct.

In April 2017 Tukaram Mundhe, the chairman and managing director of Pune Mahanagar Parivahan Mahamandal Limited (PMPML), a government-created transport body, issued a notice claiming that none of the unions at the company were authorised under the Companies Act, 1956. He ordered that the administration no longer consider any of their letters or memorandums, and that if the unions tried to “misguide” the employees of the organisation by any means, then legal action would be taken against them.

He stated that “any union that wants to work to protect the workers’ issues needs to have permission from the state or central government. There is no such authorised union that exists in PMPML now, so all the other bodies are illegal.”
Nuruddin Inamdar, general secretary of the workers’ union affiliated to the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC), said, “Our union has got permission from the industrial court and it is the right of the courts to decide whether to give permission or not to the workers’ unions. ... For the past ten years, we have been fighting for the rights of workers and various other issues.”

The Delhi Hospitals Contractual Workers Union (DHCWU) reported that on 12 April 2017 12 contract workers at the AIIMS Trauma Centre were sacked for taking up the issue with hospital authorities of not being paid minimum wages.

The 12 workers were employed by the private labour hire agency Sudarshan Facilities Pvt Ltd, which had been given the contract for hiring housekeeping staff for running the services at the AIIMS Trauma Centre.

When the employees demanded that they should be paid the legal minimum wage, the hospital administration called the police, who in turn reportedly manhandled the workers.
The workers then took up the matter with the Labour Commissioner.
“Next day, the services of the 12 employees were terminated,” said Dr Animesh Das, president of the DHCWU.
The union also wrote a letter to the Director of AIIMS in which they alleged that the Sanitary Inspector charged money for allotting duty to them, compelled them to perform the work of Class III staff, like OT technicians and computer operators, delayed payment of wages and used abusive language and sometimes even physically assaulted them.

Police fired at workers and farmers protesting outside a sugar mill on 10 April 2017. Workers formerly employed by the mill and farmers had been protesting in front of the main gate of the unit for three days. Two of them had threatened to immolate themselves if their pending salaries were not released. The factory had closed in 2002, without paying the workers their salaries or the farmers what was owed them.

The protest turned violent, and some of the workers started pelting the police with stones. The police say they only fired at the protestors in self-defence. Ramchandra Pandit, a worker from the sugar factory, sustained a bullet injury. One of the protestors said the police also roughed up a large number of people.

The Haryana state government suspended 120 Haryana Roadways workers on 12 April 2017 for going on strike and for failing to give due notice. The general managers of 24 depots of the Haryana Roadways were instructed to suspend five workers each. All 120 workers suspended were office-bearers of the roadways unions at the depot level.

The dispute was over the government’s decision to issue permits to private transport operators. The strike began after talks between the protesting state roadways employees and the government had broken down the previous day.

Union leaders held the government responsible for their strike. They alleged that while Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had in a meeting in March assured them the permits would not be issued, senior officers subsequently informed them about the decision to grant permits to private transporters.

The strike came to an end after four days following a meeting between the transport minister and the HR employee union leaders. Transport Minister Panwar said the state government would frame a new transport policy in which suggestions from the regional transport authority (RTA) and office-bearers of state roadways employees unions would be involved. The suspension notices on 120 workers would be lifted.

The permits issued to 873 buses would continue, however, with a rider that the permit holders would allow the free travel of the categories specified by the Haryana government.

Between mid-February and mid-March 2017, Omax Autos in Dharuhera sacked a total of 34 permanent workers, including the entire union body, after failed conciliation talks with the labour department officials.

The dispute began on 1 February when Omax Autos dismissed 388 contract workers, most of whom had worked in the company for 15 to 20 years. Sadly, one of those workers, Ajay Pandey, committed suicide on 13 February in despair. Protests followed, demanding that management pay compensation to the family of Ajay Pandey and calling for talks about reinstatement. The permanent workers joined in the protest in support of their “temporary” colleagues. Management did agree to compensation, under pressure, but did not rehire workers. Omar Autos operates nine units across the country, and workers reported that it had shifted production to some of its other units, making strike action ineffective.

The Uttar Pradesh government banned all forms of strikes by employees and teachers in state universities and colleges with immediate effect on 31 March 2017. The ban gave police the power to arrest, without a warrant, anybody violating the provisions of the Act and was due to continue until 30 June, to cover the examination period.

The government announced the ban under the terms of the stringent Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA). Under ESMA, employees in “essential services” are strictly prohibited from going on strike. The Act allows the states to choose the essential services for which ESMA can be invoked. Under its provisions, any person taking part in a strike shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term of up to six months.

On 18 March 2017 the Gurugram District and Sessions Court in the northern India state of Haryana sentenced 13 workers at the Maruti Suzuki India Limited plant in Manesar to life imprisonment for criminal conspiracy, destruction of evidence and murder for their alleged involvement in clashes that broke out at the car plant in July 2012. Out of 13 workers sentenced for life imprisonment, 12 were union officials.
In 2011, permanent and contract workers at the plant sought to form an independent union in a bid to end the mass casualisation of jobs and improve working conditions, but they were denied registration by Maruti Suzuki management, backed by the state government of Haryana. Although the workers eventually managed to form a union in 2012, the management refused to recognise it.
Tensions escalated into violence on 18 July 2012. An accidental fire left the company’s HR manager Awanish Kumar Dev dead, and over 100 workers were injured by the police and security guards. There is no proof that any of the condemned men were even present when the fire started; they were arrested on the basis of a list of names supplied by management.
The defence team pointed out that the investigation was biased on several crucial aspects, and noted that “During the trial the prosecution placed no substantial evidence to link workers with violence and arson.”

Workers’ lawyer Vrinda Grover stated: “These 13 are the office bearers of the union and main leaders. ... management witnesses deposed against them because they stood for workers’ rights ... there is less than tenuous evidence to link any of these 13 workers to the fire.”
The legal defence team for the Maruti workers said it would be mounting a very strong challenge to their conviction in appeal before the High Court.

A dispute at the end of February 2017 highlighted the lack of trade union rights in India’s banks. Employees of the government sector banks led by the Ludhiana unit of the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) who had been on strike since mid-February held a massive demonstration in front of Canara Bank, Bharat Nagar Chowk, on 28 February, accusing the government and Indian banks association (IBA) of not fulfilling their demands.
An UFBU convener, Naresh Gaur, addressed the rally, saying, “There are increasing instances of denial of trade union rights which include the right of representation on the Boards of the Banks, right to collective bargaining, violation of settlements, questioning to right to strike etc. Further, every effort is being made to outsource permanent jobs, in the banking industry, which is fraught with risks.”
He noted that bank employees had been fighting for two decades against government reforms in the banking industry that undermined workers’ rights.

Workers at the Suja Shoie company, which produces hydraulic presses, have been seeking recognition of their union as a collective bargaining unit since 2014. The response of management has been to intimidate workers and threaten to terminate their employment if they joined the union. All 400 plus staff are employed as contract workers and have not been made permanent even though they have been working for the company for more than seven years. One of the union’s principal demands is to regularise all staff. In a show of union unity, they came together to hoist their union flag outside their factory on 9 January 2017. The local police initially tried to bar them from holding their protest, but they were able to hoist the flag after the intervention of the Deputy Superintendent of Police.

When workers in the Aequs Special Economic Zone formed a union on 5 September 2016, management responded by promptly dismissing all eight office bearers. A further four founding members were sacked shortly afterwards. Protests followed and workers continued to be harassed and victimised by management.

Matters reached a head on 17 December when 42 workers were confined to a workshop for objecting to management’s order not to belong to the union. Other workers spontaneously joined them in protest, at which point management called the police. The police lathi-charged the workers and arrested 195 of them. A local court granted bail to 160 of them on 23 December 2016.
Following a tri-partite meeting between the union’s representatives, Aequs management and the Labour Ministry, the Minister directed management to revoke the dismissal of 15 workers and withdraw the cases filed against the workers.

Workers seeking union recognition and regular contracts at the Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India plant at Tapukara faced severe repression.

A protest was sparked on 16 February 2016 after a supervisor attacked an already exhausted contract worker for refusing to work more overtime. When colleagues staged a sit-in protest, management called police to disperse them. The police lathi-charged the workers, causing serious injuries. Hundreds of workers were arrested and 44 were kept in custody. A bail application was refused by a lower court, but later granted by the High Court.

Management suspended about 100 workers on charges of sabotage, and brought legal charges against several of them. Some 3,000 contract workers and over 500 permanent workers were dismissed. Over the next seven months, about 350 of those workers were reinstated, in the face of widespread protests and support, but the fate of around 200 permanent workers and the 3,000 contract workers remained undecided.

All this occurred against a background of consistent refusal to recognise the union formed by the workers in August 2015, the Honda Motorcycle and Scooter 2f Kamgar Union Tapukara. One of its principal demands was the regularisation the thousands of workers on precarious contracts. Following the February 2016 clash, management supported the formation of a union backed by the right-wing national trade union centre, Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), and would only negotiate with BMS.

In September 2016, management signed a collective agreement with the BMS supported union. However, none of the demands of the workers, including reinstatement of contract workers and withdrawal of police charges, were part of the settlement.

The workers’ protests for justice continued, including hunger strikes beginning on 19 September. The company hired replacement labour, and at the time of writing, the dispute had still not been resolved.

On 2 September 2016 over 100 million workers across India took part in a national strike to protest against the government’s anti-worker policies. The action was called by ten of India’s national trade union centres (INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU, AIUTUC, TUCC, SEWA, AICCTU, UTUC and LPF) frustrated at the government’s consistent indifference to their demands.

The unions were particularly concerned about the anti-worker labour law reforms pursued by the ruling National Democratic Alliance, headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). They had drawn up a 12-point charter of demands, but the government would not come to the negotiating table.

The demands included strict enforcement of all basic labour laws, an end to casualisation, amendment of the Minimum Wages Act to ensure universal coverage, a guaranteed pension for all and compulsory registration of trade unions within a period of 45 days, together with immediate ratification of ILO Conventions 87 and 98.

The September 2016 national strike was part of series of actions taken by unions, including national conventions, strikes and protests on 30 March 2016, 10 March 2016, 2 September 2015, 5 December 2014, 12 December 2013, 28 February 2012 and a historic march to parliament on 23 February 2011.

LG Electronics India Pvt. Ltd responded to the formation of a union at their factory with typical union-busting tactics. LG workers formed their union in January 2016, and applied for the registration of the LG Electronics Employees Union with the registrar of trade unions. The company employs some 2,350 workers with approximately 850 permanent workers and 1,500 contract workers.

Management reacted by promoting active union members to the staff category, to make them no longer eligible for the union. Then the registrar of trade unions denied statutory union registration citing the promotion of office bearers.

On 9 July, 11 workers, including office bearers of the proposed union, were denied entry to the factory, and management took their ID cards away. The workers were then informed that they were being transferred to different locations in distant parts of India, and asked to report to work in those places. A twelfth person received the transfer order a couple of days later. In solidarity, all permanent workers, including about 60 women, staged a sit-in protest on 11 July demanding withdrawal of the unilateral transfers, union recognition, a statutory eight-hour work, increased wages and regularisation of contract workers. Some 250 permanent workers demonstrated outside the gates of the company, while 650 permanent workers remained inside the factory on protest.

On 19 July, police detained three workers on charges of attempting to stop contract workers entering the factory. Police held the workers in custody at the Surajpur police station, refusing to release them. Owing to the arrests and the fear of being attacked by hired thugs, the workers reached an agreement with management on 20 July, which met some but not all of their demands, and withdrew their protest.

Himachal Road Transport Corporation (HRTC) dismissed 30 employees for going on strike on 16 June 2016. Eleven HRTC unions formed a joint coordination committee (JCC) that formulated several demands, including the regularisation of contract staff and protection of pension benefits. Those dismissed were all members of the JCC.

The Himachal Pradesh High Court ruled the strike “illegal”, invoking the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA), and ordered the employees to refrain from participating in the demonstration. Nearly 8,000 employees – mostly contract workers – felt strongly enough about their demands to go ahead with the strike, however, keeping over 2,800 HRTC buses off road.
The strike did not continue for a second day as originally planned.

When women garment workers in Bengaluru, Karnataka State, held a protest on 18 and 19 April 2016, the police response was brutal. The women were protesting against amendments to the Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) Scheme, which would prevent them from withdrawing their contributions fully. The All-India United Trade Union Centre (AIUTUC) described the measure as “anti-worker”, depriving the account holders of their right to make use of the facility during emergency situations.

During the protest, police lathi-charged the women, pulled their hair, manhandled them and used foul language. Video recordings showed policemen beating up women even after they had fallen to the ground and were pleading with them.

Some of the protesters were arrested and charges were brought against them.

The Tata motors Sanand plant suspended 26 workers in mid-February 2016 for protesting at the suspension of two of their colleagues. The suspension of the original two was a disciplinary measure following protests by the workers in 2015 urging management to grant them a pay rise. Following an inquiry the company decided not to reinstate them, and it was that decision that sparked the February protest. On 23 February 2015 over 400 workers at the plant went on strike to call for the reinstatement of their colleagues. The company claimed the strike was illegal.

The strike lasted a full month. Agreement was reached with management after an eight-hour meeting, and the strikers resumed work on 23 March 2016. Tata Motors agreed to revoke the suspension of 13 out of the 26 workers and take a decision about the rest following the completion of enquiries. The decision regarding two other suspended workers was to be taken after they respond to the company’s second “show cause” notice. Tata also agreed to recognise the union and begin negotiations on wages and a charter of demands.

The Labour Secretary issued an executive order on 12 January 2016 granting exemption to so-called start-up enterprises from inspection and the application of nine major labour laws, including the Trade Unions Act.

The start-up entities were defined as those incorporated or registered within the previous five years with an annual turnover not exceeding Rs 250 million (about USD 3.7 million). The nine basic labour laws concerned are the Industrial Disputes Act 1947, Trade Unions Act 1926, Building and Other Construction Workers Act 1996, Industrial Employment (Standing Order) Act 1946, Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act 1979, Payment of Gratuity Act 1972, Contract Labour (Regulation & Abolition) Act 1970, the Employees Provident Fund Act 1952 and Employees State Insurance Act 1948. The order meant that there will be no inspection by the supervisory machinery in the establishments concerned for at least for three years, allowing employers to violate basic labour laws with impunity.

Up to 200 hundred Anganwadi (childcare) workers were taken into custody in December 2015 for taking part in protests to urge the government to implement the pay rise they were supposed to have received. Many reported that they had not been paid their low wages for over four months. The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), which helped organise the protests, condemned the arrests, saying the women were fighting for their legitimate rights. The workers were also helping pay for the upkeep of the childcare centres out of their own pockets. The government did subsequently meet some of the workers’ demands, including one month’s paid medical leave, and the release of funds to build new centres.

On 31 December 2015 police detained union activists employed as contract workers under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) schemes. They were protesting outside the secretariat of the state government to express their frustration over low pay. They had had many meetings with the Rural Development Minister and other senior officials over the past seven years, but their situation had not been resolved. Furthermore, there had been advertisements for vacant posts at higher salaries, yet the contract workers who had been employed for years had not been offered regular contracts. Police tried to move the protesters on to the children’s park – out of the way of the Ministry and irrelevant to their protest. When the protestors refused, they were taken to the local police station and detained until reports had been filed.

Police arrested health workers (Accredited Social Health Activists – ASHA) on 13 December as they arrived in Kandi in the Medak district of Telangana state. They had been marching and protesting for five days. When the police arrived to break up the protest, about 20 workers were injured and five, including CITU Secretary K. Raiaiah, were taken to hospital. In another incident on the same day, scores of health workers were arrested by police in Kuknoorpally as they travelled from Sircilla to Hyderabad. There had been a number of protests by ASHA workers during the year over pay and working conditions.

On 5 November, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, Amritsar, suspended the district secretary of its employees’ union Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited Employees Union (BSNLEU). Three months earlier the union had written to management to demand the settlement of pending issues including the settlement of medical claim bills, and transfers. Management did nothing to settle the unions’ grievances, and the union believed the suspension of its secretary was in retaliation to their demands and repeated attempts at negotiation.

The management of Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC) sacked the leader of one of its recognised employees’ unions in August for leading a 52-day-old strike of contract workers during 2014. Thirumavalavan, president of DMK-affiliated Labour Progressive Front (LPF), was the subject of a year-long inquiry, and attended all disciplinary proceedings.

His dismissal came on top of a decision in July 2015 to seek a court order to restrain three leaders from the NLC Workers Progressive Union and the NLC Anna Workers and Staff Union from going on strike over a wage dispute. That strike eventually went ahead on 20 July, called by 13 trade unions after talks with management broke down. It lasted until 27 August, without the workers’ demands being met. On 3 November NLC management announced it was deducting six days wages from members of the CITU NLC Labour and Staff Union for participating in the strike.

A private security guard shot and injured a construction worker at the Swiss cement multinational Holcim’s plant at Jamul, Chattisgarh, on Saturday, 26 September 2015. Workers had not been paid for over two months, and had staged a protest to demand their pay. They were abused and pushed and then shot at, leading to one worker being injured. Another worker, a member of the Pragtisheel Cement Shramik Sangathan (PCSS) that unionises contract workers, was beaten when he tried to record the incident.

Contract workers fare particularly badly at Holcim, which only pays them the minimum wage, despite Cement Wage Board guidelines stating they should be paid the same as permanent workers.

Police in Kashmir detained several trade union leaders on 6 September, the day before they were due to gather in Lal Chowk to protest at the government’s failure to assist victims of the previous year’s floods. The protestors had warned of a complete shutdown across Kashmir. One of the leaders was Shawkat Chaudhary, Chairman of the Kashmir Economic Alliance. He had pointed out that the international community had offered to help Kashmir following the floods, but that the central government had rejected outside assistance, saying it would help the victims. One year later, it had done nothing.

In April 2015, further to a request from Air India, the Civil Aviation Ministry sought an amendment to the 1947 Industrial Disputes Act to remove pilots and aircraft engineers from the “workmen” category under the Act, effectively taking away their right to form unions, and their right to strike. By excluding pilots and engineers from the “workmen category”, the airline can change their service conditions without issuing a notice as prescribed under law. These employees will also no longer be able to approach the Labour Commissioner or an industrial tribunal in the event of a dispute. Similarly, sacked employees (who are not workmen as defined in law) cannot appeal to the Labour Commissioner or tribunals and could only seek redress in civil courts.

The proposal to amend the law was initiated at the same time as Air India was facing a challenge in the Supreme Court for cutting employee salaries by 25 per cent without following the prescribed procedure of first notifying its employees’ unions.

The change was confirmed when the Ministry of Labour and Employment announced in August 2015 that “The duties and responsibilities of a Pilot in Command (PIC) are of managerial and administrative nature and may not fall under the workman category under the Industrial Disputes Act.”

Rajdhani Power Ltd responded to peaceful protests and picketing by contract workers by seeking a court order. On 20 June 2015, one day after workers staged protests in south and west Delhi to defend their rights, the company sought a restraining order from the Delhi High Court, which prohibited employees from holding any protests within 500 metres of any of the company’s offices until 20 July.

Panchratna Mahakud , president of the Thriveni Mazdoor Sabha union, was dismissed by the Thriveni mining company on 22 June 2015 on sham charges. Prior to his dismissal B. Prabhakaran, the Thriveni owner and managing director, threatened to send him thousands of kilometres away and have him killed. Thriveni Mazdoor Sabha is a branch of the national federation of mineworkers’ unions, Hind Khadan Mazdoor Federation (HKMF) , which had been running an organising drive. The company had sought to prevent organising through a campaign of intimidation, beginning with the sacking of seven union organisers in September 2014.

As many as 268 members of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) were arrested on 9 June 2015 when they staged a road block near Tirupur railway station to demand the respect of labour rights in industrial units. Their demands included a minimum wage of INR 15,000 for eight hour shifts, and overtime allowances for every extra hour worked, and the formation of trade unions in all industrial units.

A day after over 1000 non-executive staff members of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) adopted a “fast-and-work” policy and picketed the Yamuna Bank metro station demanding better salaries, on 27 May 2015, the Delhi Police issued prohibitory orders.

Nearly 2,500 non-executive staff members of the DMRC had been protesting since 5 May, wearing black armbands over their uniforms and picketing station platforms. Their principal demands were an increase in their basic pay, job security and a more accountable Staff Council.

Twelve union activists, including two women bus conductors – Padmasri Raje and Kalawati Narwade – were arrested and then released on bail in the city of Nanded, Maharashtra state, after management called in the police. In Maharashtra, 97 per cent of bus depots were closed because of blockades by the MSTKS union, while strike action by taxi, truck and auto rickshaw drivers caused the entire road transport network to collapse. The strike was held to protest against a proposed new bill (Road Transport and Safety Bill 2014) that would have paved the way for the full-scale privatisation of the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC). The MSTKS union said the bill would among other things hand over the registration of vehicles to corporations as a first step. The strike was called after an emergency meeting between State Transport Minister Divakar Raote and representatives of all transport unions in Mumbai. The Minister agreed not to implement the bill in Maharashtra.

L.S. Sibu, an official who worked in the ground-handling department of Air India at Trivandrum Airport and regional secretary of the Aviation Industry Employees Guild, was transferred to Hyderabad in early April. The move did not respect the rules governing transfers, and fellow employees and union members believed it was in retaliation for his exposure of management’s handling of certain issues, such as the transfer of the lucrative ground handling business to a private joint venture.

In April 2015 the ITF reported that DHL had served 26 injunctions on union activists and leaders in an attempt to prevent them speaking out against labour rights abuses. Workers at DHL have been engaged in a struggle over union rights for many years. A detailed report commissioned by the ITF and based on extensive interviews with DHL workers, union officials and labour experts reveals threats, intimidation and discrimination against pro-union workers. Management have used punitive long distance staff transfers to target union activists and threaten their colleagues; have actively attempted to undermine existing unions; and are trying to prevent couriers from joining the union of their choice. As previously reported, DHL management has sought to classify couriers as “management” in an attempt to stop them joining a union, and appears to be trying to tie up the dispute in the courts for years.

In April 2015, the National Democratic Alliance government proposed integrating three labour laws – the Trade Unions Act 1926, the Industrial Disputes Act 1947 and the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act 1946 – into a single code for industrial relations. The unions protested that they had not had sufficient involvement in the preparation of the laws, which would undermine trade union rights and workers’ protection.

The draft code significantly altered how trade unions can be formed in factories and registered with the government. Under existing laws, seven members of a union could apply for registration irrespective of the establishment’s size. The draft bill proposed that at least ten per cent of the total employees or 100 workers would be needed to form a trade union.

The new draft also modified the definition of a strike to include “casual leave on a given day by the 50 per cent or more workers employed in an industry”.

The new law contained no provisions to promote collective bargaining, putting the emphasis instead on arbitration. Several provisions of the bill referred to either recognised or certified negotiating agents without providing for procedures for the recognition of such agents. Furthermore, the bill provided that all office bearers of a registered trade union would have to be actually engaged or employed in the establishments or industry with which the trade unions is concerned, restricting a union’s freedom to choose its own officers.

Another provision would allow companies employing up to 300 workers to lay off staff without government permission, as against 100 workers previously. In India 85 per cent of manufacturing firms employ less than 50 workers, and around half of these workers are kept on short-term contracts and earn just USD 5 or USD 6 per day. The government’s proposals would deprive them of vital legal protections leaving them in even more precarious circumstances.

In September India’s central trade unions, INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU, AIUTUC, TUCC, SEWA, AICCTU, UTUC and LPF 1. , called a nationwide strike in protest at the proposed reforms. Tens of millions took part in the strike. The trade unions had presented a charter of 12 demands, which in addition to opposing the labour law amendments included a new minimum wage, the end to contract labour in permanent perennial work and payment of the same wages and benefits for contract workers as for regular workers for similar work, strict enforcement of all basic labour laws, universal social security cover for all workers, compulsory registration of trade unions within a period of 45 days from the date of submitting applications, as well as immediate ratification of ILO Conventions 87 and 98.
In response to the protests, the government constituted an Inter-Ministerial Committee and assured the unions that reforms will be based on consultations. No reforms had been passed by the end of 2015.

1. INTUC – Indian National Trade Union Congress; AITUC- All Indian Trade Union Congress; HMS-Hind Mazdoor Sabha (Workers’ Assembly of India); CITU-Centre of Indian Trade Unions; AITUC- All India Trade Union Congress; TUCC-Trade Union Coordination Committee; SEWA-Self-Employed Women’s Association; AICCTU-All India Central Council of Trade Unions; UTUC –United Trade Union Congress;
LPF-Labour Progressive Federation.

The Indian Government notified of proposed changes to the Factories Act 1948 in June 2014, after a process of amendment and consultation that began in 2008. The proposed changes have promoted a number of protests from trade unions since June.

Colin Gonsalves, a senior advocate in the Supreme Court and founder of the Human Rights Law Network, reports that the amendments are “petty, anti-labour and poorly conceived” and fail to incorporate labour’s reform agenda. He lists the priority reforms of trade unions as:

• The introduction of the right to a “secret ballot” for determination of trade union recognition;
• That workers’ right to go to court should not be restricted by the requirement that they take permission from the government under Section 10 of the Industrial Disputes Act, which can delay litigation by years;
• That the two anti-labour judgments of the Supreme Court in the Umadevi case and the SAIL case be reversed by statutory decree, so that non-permanent workers who have put in long years in government services are entitled to regularisation, and that when the contract labour system is abolished by the Board, the contract workers will be regularised.

In October 2014, workers from a range of industries held a rally against the proposed labour law reforms. The rally was organised by the Workers Solidarity Centre and those involved pledged to fight the reforms, which they said would strengthen the “existing regime of exploitation and repression”.

Among those who took part in the rally were unions belonging to factories of Hero MotoCorp, Maruti Suzuki, Manesar, Nerolac Paints, Autofit, Sunbeam, Belsonica, Maruti Suzuki, Gurgaon, and Munjal Kiriu, among others.

The trade unions pointed out that the proposed amendments to the Factories Act will mean that only those units which have at least 20 workers will be legally recognised. “If the amendments are implemented, it will take away rights of thousands of workers working in small and tiny units."

On 27 February 2015, 80 trade unionists were taken into preventative custody while protesting the labour law reforms in Ongole. On that day, seven trade unions were protesting the “pro-corporate” amendments and expressing support for the unions’ 11-point charter.

The police reported that 50 trade union members were held in Kandukur, 15 were held in Ongole and a further 15 in Markapur.

Workers employed at DHL Express India reported that the company has been preventing them from joining the DHL Employees Union. The company classified couriers as management staff, which is excluded from the right to join unions under the Industrial Relations Act. In September 2014, workers organised a protest against false classification and the forced transfer and suspension of active union members in Jat Mantar.

Police charged workers at Jharkhand’s Rajmahal mine and arrested five at another mine on 7 January 2015 following a strike over the government’s coal block ordinance, which may allow private companies to mine and sell coal commercially.

“They are using the police, the Central Industrial Security Force, contractors and unsocial elements to force the strikers to join work,” said Ramendra Rai, chairman, AITUC. But the police action provoked the strikers and led to the strike becoming stronger, he added.

Coal is the most dominant energy source in India, meeting around 52 per cent of the country’s primary commercial energy needs. Coal India produces around 80 per cent of India’s overall coal and feeds 82 of the 86 coal-based thermal power plants. However, the company has fallen short of its output targets for the last six years, making the country the third largest coal importer despite sitting on the world’s fourth largest reserves of the fuel.

On 7 January 2015, the Coal India Limited reported that it shipped less than half its daily target, only 645,000 tonnes, which included the day’s production and stocks. It was still a struggle, mainly using contract workers.

Coal India has a permanent workforce of over 2.8 lakh, excluding supervisors and executives, and employs another 65,000 contract workers. The output could fall further if contract workers join the strike, the official said.

On 3 January 2015, more than 90 employees were detained for staying a sit-in-strike at NVH India Auto, a component supplier to Hyundai.

The striking workers were demanding the reinstatement of 17 workers who were dismissed after an earlier strike. They were also demanding recognition of their union.

“They were staging an sit-in-strike inside the campus since yesterday. Today, we have detained them,” a senior police official told media.

NVH India Auto supplies sun visor, headliner and floor carpet to Hyundai Motor India. The company has about 120 employees, 300 contract labourers and about 100 trainees.

In 2013, 162 workers at three warehouses exclusively contracted by PepsiCo in West Bengal were harassed, assaulted and then fired after they organised a union and submitted their demands to the company.

They were told they could return to work if they declared they will never again join a union, made to sign false statements which they were told were legally binding, and told to cut up their union cards and step on them as they walked into the warehouses. Those who refused were told they would be blacklisted and never work again.

Twenty-eight workers refused to renounce their union membership and formed the PepsiCo (Frito-Lays) Workers Action Committee.

In November 2013, the IUF filed a formal complaint against PepsiCo with the US government’s National Contact Point for the OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises.

In 2014, the complaint was accepted by the NCP, who offered the parties an opportunity to mediate the dispute. PepsiCo refused to attend.

In 2014, Aurobindo Pharma’s Pydibhimavaram plant in Srikakulam district suspended five union leaders and 26 workers, and prejudiced the employment of many others through unlawful transfers and unsubstantiated legal claims. The company management also harassed workers when they asked for a wage agreement and denied the workers entry to the plant on 26 October 2014.

This discrimination and harassment followed the company’s delay of the union’s registration in 2013, for which the workers had to protest for almost 83 days.

In response to the harassment of union leaders and members, the Indian Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU) staged protests at a number of the company’s district collectorates on 24 November 2014.

IFTU leader M Venkateswarlu called on the government to direct the company to roll back the illegal transfers, suspensions, dismissals of workers and take back illegal cases against the leaders unconditionally. “The Aurobindo Pharma management should allow workers for duties without asking for any undertakings or putting pressure on them. The only crime of the workers is forming a union one-and-a-half years ago,” he said.

Organisation for Protection of Democratic Rights (OPDR) state secretary C Bhaskara Rao alleged that the Aurobindo management denied workers their right to form a union. “The workers formed a union to secure their jobs and rights but the company management has been continuously harassing the workers. It also refused to accept the charter of demands put forth by the workers. It neither discussed the demands of the workers nor denied them and instead prolonged the issue while harassing the workers,” he alleged.

The Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO) and The India Committee of the Netherlands (ICN) published a report titled Flawed Fabrics: The abuse of girls and women workers in the South Indian textile industry in October 2014. Among a wide range of labour rights abuses, the report made the following observations with respect to the ability of workers in the industry to exercise their right to freedom of association:

• The level of unionisation in the Indian garment industry is very low. There were no unions active in any of the five textile mills investigated for the report, and not one of the interviewed workers were trade union members.
• Trade unions face widely prevalent prejudice and restrictions at the stages of formation, registration and operation. The report states: “Criminalization, threats against labour activists or striking workers, violence against union members, as well as against NGOs, is common practice”.
• The report describes the notion of freedom of association as “a dead letter” for women in the industry: “In fact, none of the interviewed workers know what a trade union is, nor are they aware that they have the right to join one.”
• The workers in the industry, many of whom are migrant workers, have little to interaction with the outside world, let alone with trade unions or labour advocates. One worker interviewed said: “We have no outside contact so how could we ever join a trade union?”
• Several workers interviewed expressed the understanding that women could not join trade unions.
• Others indicated that workers who expressed a desire to join a union were likely to be dismissed.

In October 2014, workers at the Bosch Adugodi plant in Bangalore, southern India, went on strike for over five weeks seeking better wages and conditions, the refund of wage cuts imposed for earlier strikes, an end to the harassment of organised workers and the reinstatement of victimised workers, amongst other things.

The strike was outlawed by the Karnataka state government on 10 October 2014 under the Industrial Disputes Act 1947, in what some media reported was “a blatant bid to break the strike on behalf of Bosch”.

The company then demanded the return of the workers from the “illegal” strike and announced an 8-hour pay cut for every hour of striking.

On 14 October 2014, Karnataka police arrested around 150 strikers when approximately 1,000 workers gathered in front of Chief Minister Siddarmaiah’s residence to protest the ban.

Police reported that on 3 October 2014, over 2,000 workers and their family members were arrested when they tried to picket at the NLC lignite mines in Nevyeli, Cuddalore.

The workers had been striking for the previous 31 days, pressing a 6-point charter for demands against the company. The demands included service regularisation, a wage increase and a bonus.

Several efforts had been made to settle the matter through meetings between trade unions and company management in the presence of the Central Labour Commissioner.

In September 2014, a forum of several central trade unions launched a Caravan Campaign in West Bengal pressing for the ratification of ILO conventions relating to right to freedom of association and collective bargaining.

Announcing the campaign, the West Bengal Trade Unions Joint Action Forum Sunday said the non-ratification of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention nos. 87 and 98 has been jeopardising the rights of workers across the country.

“Despite being a member of the ILO, the government of India has never bothered to ratify the Conventions. The result is there are thousands of trade unions which are regularly denied recognition and registration,” Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) secretary Prashanta Nandi Chowdhury said here.

The Forum comprises trade unions, including the Communist Party of India-Marxist affiliated CITU and CPI labour wing All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC).

The forum said as many as 2,500 labour unions had applied for registration in West Bengal between 2011-2012 but only 600 were registered.

Hind Mazdoor Sabha (HMS) reported that courts in India are independent in practice but there is a backlog of cases and it can take a very long time to get redress in the courts. Demonstrations are often restricted, as workers are not permitted to protest near governmental offices and trade unionists are often arrested for “disturbing law and order”. Public authorities and employers are not treating unions equally. In the National Thermal Power Project, management refused to bargain with HMS in the bipartite negotiation forum even though the union got the largest amount of votes in the ballot. Employers often refuse to comply with valid provisions in collective agreements. A few examples are: Graziano based in Gaziabad, Maruti Suzuki India based in Manesar and Gurgaon based in Haryana.

On 18 July 2014, trade unions from Gurgaon, Manesar and other parts of the state of Haryana marched in old Gurgaon to demand the release of 147 colleagues who were jailed after an incident at Maruti’s Manesar plant two years earlier.

On 18 July 2012, an industrial dispute escalated into violence that left a company executive dead and many other employees injured. In response, the company sacked 2,500 workers and closed the plant for over a month. The police arrested 147 workers, including union leaders.

As at 18 July 2014, the 147 workers were still in jail and facing trial.

“We demand that the 147 jailed workers be released. And that there should be an independent investigation into this incident,” said a member of one of the participating trade unions.

On 17 July 2014, the city police held a flag march, as a “warning signal to the trade unions that no disruption of peace shall be tolerated on this day”.

In June 2014, Air India unilaterally withdrew the special concession given to trade union leaders to perform union activities on a full-time basis, requiring the 15 dedicated union leaders to resume normal work duties.

The arrangement had been in place since the 1980s, and had been periodically extended until mid-2014 without reason, notice or consultation. The company communicated the decision to the affected trade unions – the Aviation Industry Employees Guild (AIEG), Air India Employees Union and Air India Service Engineers Association – without consulting with the unions or giving a reason for the decision. It is being seen as an effort to drastically cut the number of recognised trade unions in the company.

A member of the AEIG said that the unilateral withdrawal of the concession was in breach of the Industrial Disputes Act. According to AIEG’s lawyer Ashok Shetty, the airline management is bound to serve a notice under the Industrial Dispute Act before making any change in any the service condition in accordance with a Bombay High Court judgment. This was not followed in this case.

A confidential report by the Indian Intelligence Bureau, leaked in June 2014 after being given to Ministers in the new Modi Government (formed May 2014), has raised fear amongst trade unions and NGOs on a clamp down on civil liberties by government.

The report questioned the intent and sourcing of a number of NGOs, suggesting that they are responsible for a two per cent to three per cent loss to economic growth and working as fronts for foreign interests.

On 26 June 2014, 62 individuals from a range of people’s organisations, citizens’ groups, trade unions and mass movements met and signed a joint statement, describing the report as “a barely disguised official attempt to discourage and intimidate the democratic rights of citizens to express dissent with dominant state policies and to protest”. Their statement continued:

“The report particularly targets organisations which question the corporate-led development model and the nuclear policy, and champion environmental and labour rights. We are dismayed by the dubious manner with which the Indian Intelligence Bureau has maligned, demonised and criminalised many greatly respected social activists and groups in this country who have committed their lives for a social cause.”

“We see this move as an attempt to restrict democratic space for civil society action and silence dissenting voices of individuals, organisations, social movements and trade unions. It is also an attempt to stifle the voices of the defenders of human rights who represent the voiceless, marginalised sections of the society. We strongly feel that it is our right and moral duty to collectively raise and represent the voice of invisible majority of this country.”

On 9 April 2014, police stopped a protest march of labourers and arrested scores of them when they tried to proceed towards city centre Lal Chowk in Srinagar.

Scores of workers from National Front Trade Unions Federation (NFTF) staged a protest in Press Enclave against the alleged anti-labour policies pursued by the government. The protestors carrying banners and placards demanded creation of employment, enforcement of all labour laws, end to contractual work, amendment of Minimum Wages Act and fixation of statutory minimum wage of not less than Rs 10,000 per month.

The protestors called on the Government to make good the promises it has made by providing job, security and proper wages.

Seeking to stop the protest, police arrested scores of protestors including NFTF president Ashraf Lone Nizami and Fayaz Ahmed Bhat.

In 2013, 162 workers employed at PepsiCo in West Bengal organised a union. Instead of negotiating with the newly established union, the company systematically harassed and subsequently dismissed union members. In May 2013, the workers were offered reinstatement on the condition that they would never again join a union. They were asked to sign false statements and to cut up their union cards and to step on them as they walked into the warehouses. Moreover, the company threatened that all local employers would blacklist the workers who refused to comply with their demands. However, 28 workers refused to accept these conditions and formed the PepsiCo (Frito-Lays) Workers’ Action Committee in August 2013. The International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF) filed a formal complaint against the company for violation of the OECD Guidelines with the US government’s National Contact Point.

In March 2013, the Labour Ministry reported that a total of 13,525 cases were pending in labour courts across the country. The highest number of pending labour cases is in Ahmedabad with 2,194, followed by Jabalpur with 1,914.

GVKEMRI regional manager Hemanta Kumar Bhattu announced that he was hiring new drivers and emergency medical technicians to replace 108 workers who are on strike. Workers are demanding a salary of Rs 15,000 and their work hours be reduced to eight hours per day.

On 18 July 2012, two months after the establishment of the Maruti Suzuki Workers Union (MSWU) the company Maruti Suzuki India engaged thugs to intimidate trade union leaders. Police raids of workers’ homes led to the imprisonment of 147 workers and the dismissal of 546 permanent and 1,800 contract workers. The MSWU Provisional Working Committee, the leadership group of the union members who are not in jail, are demanding the release of all arrested workers and activists, including those who have spent the past year in Gurgaon Jail without bail, and 10 workers and supporters imprisoned for two months for supporting them.

In March 2013, workers at the Mahindra & Mahindra’s Nashik factory went on a tool-down strike in reaction to the suspension of their union’s General Secretary, Pravin Shinde who had been on hunger strike to press for the renewal of the wage agreement which ended in February. Wage negotiations between union and management lasted for six months. However, despite several rounds of talks, the wage agreement was not renewed.

When the Milk Food Factory Workers Union demanded the reduction of working hours from 16 to 8 hours without loss of pay and job security, management at GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) Horlicks factory in Nabha adopted discriminatory measures against union members. In April 2013, false charges were filed against trade union members, 300 workers had their wages cut without justification and court injunctions were filed to stop trade union meetings.

In February 2013, The Karnataka High Court ordered Karnataka Petroleum and Gas Workers’ Union not to instigate any action within a 500 metre radius of three LPG bottling plants owned by the Indian Oil Corporation Limited in Bangalore, Shimoga and Belgaum.

In February 2013, Goa’s state government prohibited strikes in any form in all transport services carrying passengers or goods by land or water under the Goa Essential Services Maintenance Act.

In the closing weeks of 2009, the International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF)-affiliated Federation of All India Nestlé Employees, representing more than 1,200 workers at Nestlé India’s factories in Moga, Punjab, and at Ponda and Bicholim, Goa, signed their first collective bargaining agreements after a year-long struggle. At the Nestlé Pantnagar factory in Uttar Pradesh, the Nestle Mazdoor Sangh (Nestle Workers Union) signed a first collective agreement on 5 January. As part of the final settlement, management withdrew the suspension of a founding member of the union who has now returned to work.

The generally hostile attitude of employers towards trade unions is clearly a deterrent to organising. Employers tend to either ignore the law making it illegal to dismiss a worker for their trade union activities or circumvent it by transferring workers to other locations to disrupt union activities or discourage union formation. Seeking justice through the judicial process is time consuming and very costly. Employers also establish and recognize “worker committees” or company dominated unions to avoid genuine trade union representation.