A large number of workers owing allegiance to different unions in the Gurugram-Manesar industrial belt held a meeting at Kamla Nehru Park here on Sunday in protest against the court’s March 18, 2017, verdict.
The judgment sentenced 13 Maruti Suzuki workers to life imprisonment in a case pertaining to violence at the automobile company’s Manesar plant, in which a senior manager was killed and several executives injured.
The workers also submitted a memorandum to President Ram Nath Kovind through the Gurugram Deputy Commissioner, seeking his intervention in the matter and to ensure the immediate release of the convicted workers.
Addressing the gathering, Khushiram, a member of the Maruti Suzuki Workers’ Union (MSWU) provisional working committee, talked about the history of the protracted struggle, and the ‘anti-worker role of both the Congress and BJP governments and the anti-worker attitude of the judiciary’.
Maruti Suzuki Kamgaar Union general-secretary Kuldeep Jhanghu emphasised the need for united action on behalf of all unions in the Gurugram-Manesar belt. Anil Pawar from the All-India Trade Union Congress proposed a mobilisation programme for all union in future. Reminding the workers about the beginning of the Paris Commune on March 18, Nayanjyoti from KNS talked about the significance of the Maruti struggle here, particularly the issues of contract workers.
In the memorandum to the President, the unions demand that workers who were dismissed in the wake of the violence be reinstated. It says that 12 of those convicted were office-bearers of the then union and the punishment was aimed at teaching a lesson to the entire fraternity.
Safety measures
The memorandum also talks about how workers die daily due to inadequate safety measures in factories but industrialists are never convicted.
