CITU EXTENDS SOLIDARITY TO THE BANK EMPLOYEES COUNTRYWIDE STRIKE

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions extends full support of the countrywide bank employees strike action to be staged on 22^nd October 2019 at the joint initiative of All India Bank Employees Association(AIBEA) and Bank Employees’ Federation of India (BEFI) against the destructive decision of the BJP Govt on merger of public sector banks which is detrimental to the interests of the national economy and severely affect rather squeeze the state-owned banking service network in the country.  

In fact, this disastrous exercise is meant for drastically squeezing the public sector banks’ operational areas through inevitable closure of huge number of bank-branches, severely affecting employment and also affecting the spread-over and availability of banking services to common people particularly in comparatively remote areas, besides further weakening the concerned PSBs. As a result, the private sector banks including foreign banks will get more open field for their business in the urban areas; and the vast rural areas will be left virtually without any banking services. Also the Govt’s own scheme of direct benefit transfer (DBT) on various welfare measures in the rural areas is destined to get squeezed and infractuous; it will virtually deprive the poor of their legitimate benefits owing to non-availability and/or decline of the bank branches in the rural vicinity.

The experience of previous cases of merger of banks established the inevitability of such disastrous consequences. After merger of 5 Associate Banks with State Bank of India, around 1000 branched had been closed. Merger of Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank with Bank of Baroda is going to shut down around 800 more branches. A substantial section of those closed or going-to-be-closed branches are in the rural areas, where the private banks never tread even by mistake.

The merger of banks is being justified by the Govt on ground of strengthening and consolidating the concerned banks; but in reality such merger will further weaken all the banks post merger. Problems of public sector banks emanate from the deliberate default in loan-repayment by the big corporate houses and solution lies in stern action by the Govt for outright recovery of the huge loan amounts from defaulter corporates with penalty.  Instead, the Govt of the day is busy in legitimizing pilferage of bank money by the defaulter corporates through Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code Procedure, forcing the public sector banks to sacrifice substantial portion their legitimate dues just to favour the defaulters. The Govt of the day is  actually engaged in destruction of the of the country’s financial service network which got widely expanded post nationalization of banks and insurance sector. This is detrimental to national interests.

CITU welcomes the initiative of the bank employees movement to fight and resist this damaging and destructive exercise by the BJP Govt at the centre and extends full support to the joint decisions of AIBEA and BEFI to go for countrywide strike on 22^nd October 2019 as a part of their resistance struggle. CITU calls upon all the trade unions countrywide and CITU unions in particular to mobilize and hold solidarity demonstrations in front of banks in their respective area country wide on the day of the bank strike.

General Secretary 

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) strongly condemns the totally authoritarian move by the JNU Administration, with active connivance of the BJP government at the centre, to evict the students union of the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi from the office allotted to it. On 15^th October 2019, the Dean of students issued an atrocious notice stating that the JNU Student Union has to vacate the JNUSU office by 5pm today ( 16^th October 2019) and that they would “double lock” the room immediately. The frivolous pretext given was of ‘non-notification’ of the Student Union itself by the University administration.

We would like to remind the JNU Administration that JNUSU is a democratically elected students’ body and its election process and results were legitimized by the Delhi High Court which had directed the JNU administration to formally notify the new union.

This not only a manifestation of an authoritarian assault on democratic rights in general and student’s rights in particular, but also a brazen assault on reason and rationality which is supposed to prevail on the university campuses in any democratic country, worth the name.

The CITU demands that the University Administration immediately, rescind the notice of eviction and desist from any undemocratic move which would result in unrest on the university campus.

CITU expresses it’s solidarity with student community of JNU and assures the support of the working class in their fight for democratic rights.

Issued By
Tapan Sen
General Secretary

Centre of Indian Trade Union expresses its grief at the demise of Comrade R Shrinivas, Vice President of Karnataka State CITU. He passed away yesterday (11 October 2019) at Bangalore due to massive heart attack while attending a meeting.

Comrade Shrinivas was the leader of CITU union in BPL who has led the historic strike in 1998. He was victimized and implicated in a false case by the management for which he was sentenced for life imprisonment. He had spent more than 16 years in jail and was released only in 2016. He continued to remain committed to the cause of the working class and immediately after the release became active in the trade union activities in Bangalore city. He was the Vice President of state CITU. He was an inspiration to the fighting workers all over the country.

His death is a loss to the CITU especially CITU Karnataka.

CITU Secretariat expresses its deepest condolences to all his comrades and family members.

Issued by 
Tapan Sen
General Secretary

Joint Memorandum by Central Trade Unions - September 2019

The Government of India has been engaged in negotiating the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), a mega-regional Free Trade Agreement that includes East and South East Asian economies. The negotiations began in 2012 and there are systematic efforts being made to conclude the negotiations before the end of 2019. We, the undersigned central trade unions, are writing to express serious concerns on the implications of India’s joining this mega FTA for the people of our country, particularly for industrial, services and agricultural workers.

RCEP proposes to impose a tariff-free regime covering almost all industrial and agricultural products. This will enable manufacturing powerhouses such as China and Japan, as well as the dominant players in agricultural, dairy and plantation products such as Australia, New Zealand and several South East Asian countries to increase their stranglehold over the markets of RCEP members. Thus, India faces the threat of import surge if the RCEP negotiations go as planned. This would make domestic producers non-viable. India’s workers have already suffered heavily from trade liberalisation agreed to in the FTAs with under the ASEAN members, Korea and Japan, especially in sectors such as plantations, and those producing electrical and electronic products. The proposed tariff liberalization under RCEP is likely to adversely affect the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) quite considerably. This will have cascading effect on the large organised sector that is linked to MSMEs along the supply chain. In order to remain competitive and to keep businesses afloat, the burden of adjustment following trade liberalisation will be shifted to workers. To survive, industries will resort to greater informalisation, depress real wages, and remove social benefits. Employment intensive industries such as garments, leather, gems and jewellery have already been impacted through decline in production due to increased imports. Dairy, steel, electronics and appliances, copper, aluminum, pharmaceuticals, textiles and automobiles and auto parts are some of the industries expected to be adversely affected by this new round of liberalisation.

RCEP countries account for 61% of India's overall trade deficit, amounting to US$ 112 billion in 2018-19. Whereas India had initially announced that import duties on 42.5% products imported from China would be eliminated, India’s northern neighbour is demanding that India must remove import duties on 80-85% of imports. Should this happen, existence of a large share of India’s industry would be at risk, which turn will lead to job losses at unprecedented levels. With a trade deficit of $53 billion, China already accounts for nearly one-half of India’s total trade deficit even without an FTA. Several industries have already communicated their deep concerns about this impending threat.

30^th September 2019, Parliament Street, New Delhi

Declaration

The Modi-led BJP Government has completed its 100 days of its second term in Office. And the country and her people are facing a continuing economic slowdown, continuing job-losses, sky-rocketing unemployment, widening and deepening impoverishment, faster decline in average level of earnings, reckless privatisation and foreignisation of national productive assets, destruction of indigenous manufacturing capabilities leading to deindustrialization and abnormal rise of economic inequality in the society to an obscene level- mocking at the slogan of “sabka sath sabka vikash”. Now, with a greater arrogance, the same destructive economic policies targeting the democratic rights and livelihood of the mass of the people are being pursued, setting in motion further worsening of the situation.   And more undemocratically than ever before – be it the passing of Wage Code Bill, introduction of Code on Occupational Health, Safety and Working Conditions, amendment to the RTI Act to cripple it, amendment to Unlawful Activities Prevention Act to make it even more draconian and vindictive, abrogation of Article 370 without consulting people of J & K, in fact by gagging them, or rendering lakhs of people homeless/ stateless through the NRC process. Now many BJP ruled states have been advocating for NRC process to divide people on communal lines. This ongoing destructive process must be combated for the unity of the people.

Each and every demand in the 12-point charter, of the Central Trade Unions, independent federations and associations, supported by the Joint National Forums of Peasants’ Organizations and highlighted through various agitations with a continuity such as nation-wide strikes on 2nd September 2015  2nd September 2016, the three day Maha-padav, on 9--11^th Nov, 2017  before the Parliament, the Nationwide strike by Scheme Workers on 17^th January 2018, Satyagrah and protests in almost all the states on varying dates beginning from 23^rd January to 23^rd February 2018 and the two-days’ strike on 8-9 January, 2019,  adoption of ‘Workers’ Charter’ in a joint national convention of trade unions on 5^th March on the eve of the general elections, have simply been ignored by the BJP Government. The budget presented on 5^th July was out and out pro-corporate and anti-common people. The Government has announced its intention to introduce the remaining two Codes: Code on Social Security and the Code on Industrial Relations, all together aiming at imposing conditions of extreme exploitation of the working people.

The Central Govt. not only failed to respond to the genuine demands of the working people, but continued its brazen aggression against the rights of workers, in the interest of their Corporate masters. Bipartism and tripartism is given a go-by. Labour laws are being sought to be overhauled in favour of the employers’ class.  The BJP Govt. continues to vindictively deprive the biggest Central Trade Union in the country, the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) from all representations. No Indian Labour Conference has been held after July, 2015. Pre-budget consultations have become a sham.

Continuing phenomenon of alarmingly increasing unemployment along with joblosses across the sectors, declining GDP rates, increasing gap between the rich and the poor- all revealing a terminal slowdown in the national economy  are sought to be brushed under the carpet by fudging figures. The phenomenon of closure and shut-down of automobile industries and the ancillaries and the forecast of huge job-losses including in the IT sector is adding fuel to the fire. Price-rise of essential commodities including public transport, electricity, medicines etc is mounting miseries on daily lives of the people in general, both in urban and rural areas, leading to widening as well as deepening impoverishment. Drastic cut in Government expenditure in social sector and various welfare schemes has made the conditions of workers, particularly those in unorganized sector more precarious.

Sir/Madam,

National Platform of major central trade unions has decided to hold a National Open Mass convention of Workers on 30 September 2019, at Parliament Street, New Delhi to decide the future course of struggles against the aggressive onslaught of Modi -2 Government on the rights and livelihoods of the people in general and working class in particular pushing relentless privatization and bringing 100% FDI in the CPSEs including Railways, Defence and power sector, merger of banks doing away the rights of the workers earned through decades of struggles including the basic rights of eight hours working day and minimum wages through the labour codes in spite of the opposition.

The National Convention will declare various programmes of action including Nationwide General Strike.

The meeting will be attended by trade union leaders and activists from all over the country from both organised and unorganized sectors. The meeting will also be attended by leaders and cadres of independent National Federations of workers and employees from various sectors including State and Central Government employees, Bank, Insurance, Telecom, Railways, Defence, Electricity, Coal, Steel, Energy, Petroleum, Road transport, Air transport, Water transport, Port and Dock, Metal and Mining, IT etc.

The decision to hold the convention was decided in the meeting of Central Trade Unions- INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU, AIUTUC, TUCC, SEWA, AICCTU, UTUC and LPF held on 21st August 2019 at New Delhi.

Please attend personally or send your Reporter/Photographer/Crew to cover the event.

DATE AND TIME: 11.00 AM, 30 SEPTEMBER 2019
VENUE: PARLIAMENT STREET NEW DELHI

Issued by
A R Sindhu, Secretary, CITU (Mob. No.9968312406)

For
INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU, AIUTUC, TUCC, SEWA, AICCTU, UTUC, LPF

Centre of Indian Trade Unions heartily congratulates and salutes the coal workers of the country for the historic total strike on 24^th September 2019. The coal workers went on strike against the decision of the BJP government led by Modi to allow 100% FDI through the automatic route in extraction and sale of coal.

The BJP government has allowed 100% FDI in coal mining through the automatic route. The foreign companies can not only extract coal from our coal mines but also sell them at market prices including exporting it. The government allowed these profits to be siphoned off to their countries. By going on a total strike against this the coal workers have once again proved that it is they, as part of the working class, who are really determined to protect the interests of the nation. Through the strike they have expressed their strong patriotic feelings.

On the contrary the BJP, its government and its Prime Minister Modi have once again exposed that their topmost priority is to serve their corporate masters, domestic and foreign. Patriotism and nationalism for them are only rhetoric meant to fool the people. Despite the decision of the workers to go on strike, the government went ahead with issuing the notification.

Through their total strike opposing free entry to foreign companies not only to mine coal from our country’s coal mines but also to sell and export it at market price, not only pocket profits through such sales but also to siphon off these profits out of the country, the coal workers have proved that it is they, a part of the working class that is determined to protect the nation’s interests; that it is the working class which is patriotic.

It is to be recalled that around a century ago, 50000 workers passed a resolution calling for ‘swaraj’ in a meeting called by the first national trade union centre of the country, the All India Trade Union Congress in Jharia coal belt. Today lakhs of coal workers in around 600 mining establishments spread across 82 mining areas in the country had to go on strike to protect national interests and national sovereignty which the BJP government is determined to mortgage.

The united trade union movement has called an open mass convention on 30^th September 2019 near Parliament to announce a struggle programme against such sell of the country’s natural resources, its public sector and attack workers’ basic rights and benefits to the profit greedy corporates.

CITU appeals to all the workers, irrespective of affiliations, to unitedly resist and defeat these anti national, anti people and anti worker policies of the BJP government led by Modi.

Issued by
Tapan Sen
General Secretary

CITU extends support to the two days' strike called by four federations of bank officers unions in all the banks of the country on 26-27 September 2019 against the destructive decision of the BJP Govt on merger of public sector banks and imposition of burden on the people through so called banking sector reforms. It is reported that unions of non officer  employees of public sector banks are also planning strike action in banks against the same destructive decisions of the BJP Govt on merger of banks and other reforms in the month of October. CITU extends wholehearted support to all those actions to defend and protect the public sector banking network of the country from the ongoing onslaughts of the BJP Govt-private corporates destructive nexus. CITU calls upon the working class to stand in solidarity to bank employees struggles.

Issued by:
Tapan Sen
General Secretary

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions denounces the utterly destructive decision of merging 10 public sector banks into 4 entities, thereby reducing the number of public sector banks to 12.

In fact, this disastrous exercise is meant for drastically squeezing the public sector banks’ operational areas through inevitable closure of huge number of bank-branches, severely affecting employment and also affecting the spread-over and availability of banking services to common people particularly in comparatively remote areas, besides further weakening the concerned PSBs. As a result, the private sector banks including foreign banks will get more open field for their business in the urban areas; and the vast rural areas will be left virtually without any banking services. Also the Govt’s own scheme of direct benefit transfer (DBT) on various welfare measures in the rural areas is destined to get squeezed and infractuous; it will virtually deprive the poor of their legitimate benefits owing to non-availability and/or decline of the bank branches in the rural vicinity.

The experience of previous cases of merger of banks established the inevitability of such disastrous consequences. After merger of 5 Associate Banks with State Bank of India, around 1000 branched had been closed. Merger of Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank with Bank of Baroda is going to shut down around 800 more branches. A substantial section of those closed or going-to-be-closed branches are in the rural areas, where the private banks never tread even by mistake.

And such phenomenon of squeezing of operational area of banking services is also going to have damaging impact on channelizing  of savings of  common people through bank deposits, in the track of developmental activities/projects and employment generating commercial activities; rather this is going to be provocation and/or allurement  for diverting common peoples’ savings either to speculative market or towards dubious chit-fund instruments.

The merger of banks is being justified by the Govt on ground of strengthening and consolidating the concerned banks; but in reality such merger will further weaken all the banks post merger. Problems of public sector banks emanate from the deliberate default in loan-repayment by the big corporate houses and solution lies in stern action by the Govt for outright recovery of the huge loan amounts from defaulter corporates with penalty.  Instead, the Govt of the day is busy in legitimizing pilferage of bank money by the defaulter corporates through Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code Procedure, forcing the public sector banks to sacrifice substantial portion their legitimate dues just to favour the defaulters. The Govt of the day is  actually engaged in destruction of the of the country’s financial service network which got widely expanded post nationalization of banks and insurance sector. This is detrimental to national interests.

CITU strongly condemns such destructive move and hails the proactive move of the United Forum of Bank Unions to launch immediate protest countrywide. They will definitely launch a bigger militant action to resist this destructive game plan of the Govt. CITU calls upon the working class also raise their voice of protest with active solidarity with the struggling bank employees.

(Tapan Sen )
General Secretary