T U Movement

Why Labour on the Defensive
J M Kaul

Despite a long record of struggle and sacrifices the trade union movement in India today is facing serious problems some of which are the result of the onslaught of global capitalism on the working class movement and others are because of weaknesses and shortcomings within the movement.

With global capitalism having spread its net across the entire world and having crossed national barriers to make the market place of every country a part of the global market the working people of India and even the sovereign governments of countries are under constant pressure to conform to the requirements of international capital. Much has been written about this and there is general awareness of it within the movement and hence this brief article will refer to some of the weaknesses and shortcomings within the movement.

According to an NSSO (National Sample Survey) conducted in 1999-2000 the workforce in India consisted of 397 million workers of which around 28 million or about 7 percent were employed in the organized sector and 370 or 93 percent in the unorganized sector. With the process of downsizing and outsourcing continuously going on in the organized sector the number in that sector is constantly shrinking and the number in the informal sector is growing. In both sectors of the economy the number of the unemployed and partially employed fluctuates but is generally on the rise especially in periods of recession.

Over the years the trade union movement has been able to bring about improvements in the wage levels and living conditions of the workers in the organized sector and also been able to get the government to put in place a considerable amount of legislation to safeguard the rights of the workers in regard to working hours, safety measures, working environment, dearness allowance linked to cost of living index etc.

However the logic of capitalism requires enterprises to constantly cut costs to be competitive and to maximize profits. The best way to do this is to reduce labour and this they are able to do with the help of technology which enables them to increase production and productivity and at the same time reduce costs despite some slight increases in the emoluments of the workers who continue in direct employment. This process has been constantly going on with the number of those thrown out of employment and those pushed into the informal sector growing.

This is one of the many problems that the trade union movement in India has been facing particularly since the new economic policy of liberalization, privatization and globalization started in 1989-90. The divisions and the fragmentations of the trade union movement has enabled the forces of global capitalism to entrench themselves and to make deep inroads into the Indian economy.

Although it is well known that the strength of the workers lies in their unity, it is an unfortunate fact that today the working class movement is politically divided. While there are four major central trade union organizations, there are in all 11 recognized by the Ministry of Labour each affiliated to a political party. The divisions are reflected further in each industry and within each unit or factory within the industry. It is true that on occasions all the central trade union organizations act jointly particularly when giving strike calls such as was done on the 28th of February 2012. But the divisions and the in-fighting between the unions within each enterprise and each unit seriously weaken the movement and enable the top managements of the companies to push through their plans, governments often standing by or even helping the managements because of their obsession with achieving higher GDP growth. This growth is linked to the increasing production, productivity and profitability of enterprises in the various sectors of the economy.

This division on political lines has taken place as a result of a number of historical factors but is continuing because on the one hand the workers and the trade unions are able to obtain some benefits by using the leverage of their political parties with the help of their MPs, MLAs and where the political party is the ruling party or part of a ruling coalition it has a clout that the trade union can take advantage of. On the other hand the leaders of the trade unions are able to use the backing of the workers as a stepping stone on which to build their political careers. But it is obvious that in this kind of a relationship the interests of the workers are often subservient to the interests of the party to which the union is affiliated.

The other big weakness of the trade union movement is that it covers only the workers in the organized sector which as mentioned above comprises less than 7 percent of the workforce. This 7 percent today includes workers in some of the high tech industries such as the IT industry. While the workers in companies such as INFOSYS and WIPRO or TCS are indeed part of the wage labour in the organized sector they by no means form a contingent of the proletariat that has nothing to lose but its chains. They, particularly those that have availed of the stock options offered by their companies, have their Mercedes and their bank balances and their bungalows to lose. Indeed their interests are closer to those of the owners than to those of the workers.

It is clear that unless a large section of the workers in the informal sector is drawn into the movement it will remain a very ineffective force. The task of organizing these workers is not easy as unlike workers in the organized sector they are scattered in thousands of small enterprises spread across the country. Moreover among the workers in the informal sector the largest number would be agricultural workers who work in farms during the sowing or the harvesting season. While they are undoubtedly wage labourers many of them work on the farms of small or middle peasants and may be slightly better off than their employers. Obviously a very different approach needs to be made to organize them. There are a number of NGOs in the rural areas who are organizing the rural poor which includes both small and middle peasants and the labour occasionally employed by them and they need to work together to improve their lot.

Some years ago a workshop was organized under the auspices of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences on the initiative of the Gandhi Labour Foundation where leaders of all the major central trade union organizations were present and where a number of decisions were taken to organize the workers in the unorganized sector. Unfortunately not much progress has been made in this direction since then. The effort needs to be continued and the trade union organizations will have to deploy their resources both financial and physical to bring about a change in the situation.

Frontier
Vol. 45, No. 40, Apr 14- -20, 2013

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