Centre of Indian Trade Unions expresses deep concern at the mass retrenchments of employees in the IT sector. IT majors like Cognizant, Infosys, and Capgemini have reportedly announced retrenchment of thousands of workers. While Capgemini has already laid off around 5000 workers, Cognizant is reported to be laying off 7000 of its workers. Infosys announced that around 10% of its employees at different levels, 2200 at senior manager level and around 4000-10000 at the associate and middle level will be fired.

All these IT multinational companies have been earning huge profits and there is no reason to retrench employees. The firing operations are being taken up on the pretexts of ‘growth plans’, ‘restructuring’, ‘role rationalisation’ etc, which are nothing but measures to maximise their profits at the cost of employees.

It is highly regrettable that the BJP government at the centre as well as the different state governments have remained silent spectators to this illegal firing of employees.

CITU commends the IT employees in different states, who are resisting these illegal measures of IT companies and are gradually getting organised to collectively fight this injustice.

CITU demands the government at the Centre as well as the concerned State governments to stop this illegal retrenchment of IT employees and take measures to protect them. It reiterates its support and solidarity to the IT employees and urges upon them to continue their collective resistance.

CITU also calls upon all its members and state committees to strongly oppose the illegal retrenchments by the IT multinational companies and stand in support of the IT employees.

Issued by
Hemalata
President

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) is deeply grieved on the passing away of Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta, the veteran trade union leader of the country and eminent parliamentarian for decades, this morning in Kolkata after prolonged illness. He was 84 years of age.

Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta breathed his last on 31 October, on the very day a century before when India’s first central trade union, the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC), was formed heralding the unity and struggle of the working class movement and workers participation in the national freedom movement, the legacy of which both AITUC and CITU carries. He led the AITUC as its general secretary for more than a decade.

Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta joined the communist movement from his student days. He was an eminent national level student leader and steered the All India Students Federation for long. Later, he joined the trade union movement. His association with the working class movement was for more than five decades.

Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta played important role in broadening the united platform of trade unions to lead the working class struggle against neoliberal economic policy regime.

Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta was member of both Houses of the Parliament, the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha, for two and half decades championing the cause of the working class and all other marginalized sections of the people which made him an outstanding parliamentarian.  

CITU salutes the departed leader in memory of his great contribution for the cause of toiling people, for their rights and livelihood; in defending the democracy and the unity and integrity of the country and its people.

Demise of Comrade Gurudas Dasgupta is a big loss to the working class and democratic movement of the country. 

CITU pays respectful homage to the departed leader and conveys its heartfelt condolence to the comrades of AITUC and his bereaved family members.

(Tapan Sen) 
General Secretary

A National Convention of Oil & Petroleum Workers was held at Mumbai on 26^th October 2019. It was jointly organized by the Trade Unions of the different affiliations as well as the unaffiliated ones functioning in ONGC, IOC, OIL, BPCL and HPCL. Around 350 workers representatives from these oil PSUs from all over the country participated in the convention.  

INTUC, AITUC and the United Federation of CITU affiliated and other Independent Unions were represented by their principal national Office Bearers. Also national leaders of INTUC, AITUC, CITU and Sena Kamgar Federation addressed the convention and pronounced their support in the strike against privatization.

The Convention condemned the Narendra Modi Government for its suicidal decision and aggressive move for Privatization of even the strategic PSUs and Government Departments including Defense Production, Public Sector Banks and Insurance, Railways, Public Road Transport, Ports, etc. and many excellently run PSUs including in the sectors of Coal, Power, Steel, Oil & Petroleum, Heavy Engineering, and Container Services.

CITU representative Swadesh Dev Roye presented the Declaration of the Convention. The Declaration noted that in the past, to justify divestment of equity of PSUs, the Governments and private business lobbies used to resort to vilification campaign over the so called poor performance of the PSUs concerned.  But the shocking decision of the present Government to completely privatise the excellently run Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) has clearly established that the Central Government of the day is totally under the clutch of few crony private business giants and their foreign collaborators. Because given the all round physical and financial efficiency of BPCL and HPCL even the enemies of PSUs cannot attach the ‘poor performance’ tag on BPCL and HPCL.

The participants in the deliberations of the Convention expressed strong opposition and deep resentment to the disastrous move of the Union Government to privatize BPCL and HPCL. It (the Convention) declared that in view of the strategic importance of oil PSUs, excellent physical and financial performance during the decades of their operation and the huge physical assets created by both the oil PSUs, handing over these national assets to private oil giants both domestic and foreign would be a clear act of betrayal to the nation and to the people by the Government of the day. And the consequence of the execution of the shocking decision shall affect the lives of the people, the economy and national security of the country.

The Convention adopted the following ‘Action Programmes’ and appealed to the workers of BPCL and HPCL to come forward irrespective of affiliation and take part in the Action Programmes. Convention also appealed to the other  Oil and Petroleum PSU workers to extend active solidarity support to the Action Programmes.

Convention further appealed to the ‘Ten Central Trade Unions and National Federations and Confederations’ Joint Platform to extend support to the instant anti-privatisation struggle of Oil & Petroleum workers and respond to invitation to participate in the next National Convention to be held in New Delhi on 20th November 2019.

PROGRAMME OF ACTION

ONE DAY TOKEN STRIKE ON 28^th NOVEMBER, 2019 (From 6.00 A.M ON 28^TH NOVEMBER to 6.00 A.M ON 29^TH NOVEMBER, 2019) BY ALL REFINERIES, MARKETING AND PIPELINE WORKERS OF BPCL and HPCL AT ALL WORK PLACES IN THE COUNTRY

The following programmes of Campaign, Propaganda and Agitation to be carried out by the Unions jointly with the objective to ensure massive mobilization and participation of workers of BPCL and HPCL in the strike:

1)    All the Unions to serve Strike Notice on 11^th November 2019

2)    Observance of ‘ALL INDIA PROTEST WEEK’ by organizing  Rallies, Processions, Gate Meetings jointly by Permanent and Contract Workers during 11^th to 17^th November 2019. Massive Postering and distribution of Leaflets amongst workers, their family members and General Public.

3)    With Bigger Participation, next National Convention of Petroleum Workers from all the Oil & Petroleum PSUs at New Delhi on 20^th November 2019. Central Trade Unions Leaders and Members of Parliament shall be invited to address

4)    Massive Day-long ‘DHARNA’ at the Gate of all the Refineries, Regional Headquarters and all other WORK LOCATIONS of BPCL and HPCL throughout India on 26^th November 2019

5)   In the unfortunate event of the Central Government move forward for privatization of the Oil PSUs, Multiple-days Strike Action shall be decided at appropriate time to stop privatization by all means.

Released to Press by
Swadesh Dev Roye
Secretary CITU
+91-9868524570

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) congratulates the workers, CITU state committee and other trade unions in Delhi for their united efforts and success in achieving significant minimum wage rise above Rs.15,000 as on 1 November, 2019 for the first time as per 15^th Indian Labour Conference (ILC) recommendations, which were upheld and improved by the Supreme Court in their Raptakos Brett judgement in 1991; which has now again been confirmed by the Supreme Court in their Order of 14 October 2019 in the SLP case filed by Delhi Government against the Delhi High Court’s order of quashing its earlier notification of 3 March 2017 on ground of lack of employers proper representation in the Minimum Wage Advisory Board. CITU Delhi state committee is an intervener party in the Supreme Court case.  

The Supreme Court, in its earlier Order had directed Delhi government to reconstitute the advisory board, hold the its meetings, accordingly prepare the draft notification afresh and submit the same before the Supreme Court; and till that time implement the 3 March 2017 notification.

Accordingly, after discussion in the reconstituted Advisory Board, with wider employers and employees representation, the draft notification was submitted by Delhi government to the Supreme Court with Rs.14,842 as the lowest category minimum wage for unskilled workers which with DA will be more than Rs,15000 as on 1 November 2019. The Supreme Court has now approved and asked the Delhi government to go ahead with this notification.

Issued by
Tapan Sen
General Secretary

 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.