Persecution of Contract Workers in Chhattisgarh

C Rammanohar Reddy

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Persecution of Contract Workers in Chhattisgarh

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The latest incident occurred on 6 March, when Y P Singh, the security offi cer of Ambuja Cements (which is now controlled by Holcim) got into an altercation in the village market of Rawan, district Raipur, where the company is situated. According to villagers, he was brandishing his revolver, threatening and abusing people, when some unidentified youth chased and roughed him up. Using this incident as a pretext, Y P Singh and another company official have lodged a bogus police complaint accusing senior u nion leaders of dacoity, alleging that they have snatched the cartridges of his revolver! Hundreds of villagers are witness that these leaders were never at the spot, but the police has maliciously implicated them in such a s erious offence in a completely spurious case. This highlights the present atmosphere of r epression in Chhattisgarh.

This incident has to be viewed in the context of the union’s struggle to protect the rights of contract workers, a majority of whom are from local peasant families and whose lands were acquired for the plant and mines. The union has organised the contract workers to demand minimum wages, provision of provident fund slips, statutory proofs of employment, etc. Before the workers were unionised, this Swiss multinational giant was even deducting money for safety helmets and boots from their paltry wages!

The contract workers’ struggle in this plant is unique in the support that they have drawn from local farmers, who are also organised for their own grievances against the company. The company has not yet rehabilitated all the farmers whose lands it occupied 25 years ago. The company has also failed to fulfil its promise of providing employment and is accused by

the villagers of illegally encroaching their nistari (common) lands.

This joint struggle by farmers and contract workers for their lawful rights has resulted in a severe backlash of repression against their organisations. Over 75 of the most active union workers have lost their jobs at the factory in the past six months, and police cases were registered against 20 workers and farmers last year by simply l abelling them “criminal elements”.

The cement wage board award (known as the Nevatia award), to which Ambuja Cement (now, Holcim) is a signatory, is a hard-won agreement between All India Cement Manufacturers Association and the central trade unions. According to this agreement no contract labour would be employed in cement manufacture at all, and even if such labour is employed, it would be limited to the loading and unloading of raw materials and packing, and would be paid at the same rate as the permanent workers.

This landmark award is being grossly and blatantly violated by all private cement plants in Chhattisgarh, including the multinational companies, Holcim and Lafarge, and the huge Indian company Ultratech of the Aditya Birla group. The proportion of permanent workmen in Chhattisgarh cement plants is barely 10%. Holcim, which pays its European workmen $8 for every hour, pays their counterparts

– the contract workers of Chhattisgarh – a mere $2 for an entire day (a 32-fold difference)! It is a small wonder that Holcim has closed down its Spanish plants, is preparing to close down plants in the United States, while planning several more plants in Chhattisgarh.

Farmers, organised under the banner of the “Udyog Prabhavit Kisan Sangh” are strongly opposing the setting up of new cement plants. These farmers have faced displacement with paltry compensation and there is an almost universal violation of the state’s rehabilitation policy promising permanent employment to one family member per affected family. Today, the farmers also face a severe crisis of water for irrigation purposes since water is getting diverted for industrial houses, and cement companies are encroaching on village commons – grazing grounds, roads, canals, and village ponds. Recently, a dam built for irrigation

vol xlvi no 13

EPW

Media and Corruption

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However, there is a larger process operating in the Indian media that is making it more corrupt and devoid of ethics and values. Media in India is becoming more “hyperreal”, in the sense that Jean Baudrillard used it to mean that there is no longer a “reality” that television allows us to see. Indian news television constructs a new reality which is different from the ground reality and this new reality is considered as ultimate and true by the people who view it. Duplicity becomes part of corporate media culture and hypocrisy is embedded in the character of the public personality.

Television constructs a new reality on the basis of which public opinion is formed. This becomes a direct threat to democracy because the public figure is no longer motivated to be genuinely responsive to the codes of ethics and justice but is more concerned about maintaining his “media image”. The political leader may not do constructive work but project an image through the media that he is working for the people. Justice may not be done but it just needs to be shown through the media that it is done. Politics and public life become a form of constructed symbolism and media becomes the carrier of these drafted symbols. Henceforth, the success or failure of a political leader, the capitalist and the media personality, lies not in maintaining ethics and integrity but in making sure that impropriety is not exposed in the public domain. The grand cover-up during “Radiagate” by the mainstream media was part of such an attempt, which was, thankfully, thwarted due to the responsible journalism of some prominent editors and the alternate media.

Before the liberalisation era in India, the bureaucratic apparatus was considered to be the villain of the piece, an abode of corruption and inefficiency. Capitalism is much more dangerous since it is based on the philosophy of dissatisfaction. Only when one is dissatisfied, there emerges the need for more consumption, which leads to further growth and revenues. A person becomes corrupt because of this underlying state of dissatisfaction. Such corruption is more deep-rooted but it is camoufl aged to appear just and fair. Corrupt media in a capitalist society is a fallout of the larger process of consumerism.