Company claims it is rift between contractors and daily wagers; GACL has no role in it.
Known for its rapid industrial growth, Gujarat is now facing union problems. On Monday, some 600-800 employees of Gujarat Alkalies & Chemicals Ltd (GACL) in Vadodara went on strike.
After the General Motors union strike in Vadodara in 2011 and the ongoing strike of Reliance employees at its textile plant in Naroda in Ahmedabad, it is now Chemical Majdoor Panch, the union of GACL, that has gone on strike.
The union claims that the employees went on an agitation for an hour between 8:30 am and 9:30 am and demanded either hike in wages or permanent employment. They threatened of going on full strike, but staged an hour’s token strike.
Union president Asim Roy claims that the workers have asked GACL authorities to meet their demands in 15 days or else they will go on a full strike, resulting in total halt in production.
“There is discrimination between workers and employees. The employees get a minimum salary of Rs20,000 while the workers draw Rs4,000. Even the peons earn more than the workers, who have a bigger role to play in the production process,” said Roy.
Arvind Parmar, member of the union, claims that in the past two years, they have got a hike of Rs10 to Rs15 per on daily basis. “It is nothing! We get some Rs175 daily which amounts to Rs4,500 or less per month. We are working on daily wages for more than 15 years. And it is only now that we have demanded the authorities to make us either permanent or at least increase our wages to Rs12,000 per month,” said Parmar.
The management claims that only the contractual workers went on agitation. “They protested outside GACL premises. The rift is between the workers and the contractor. Company has no role in it,” said a company official.
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