Workers from 23 hot rolling steel plants in Wazirpur Industrial Estate protested at Jantar Mantar on Thursday and submitted a memorandum to the Minister of Labour and Employment’s Office.
The protestors working at the hot rolling steel plants — where iron blocks are converted into steel — have been on strike since June 5 demanding that they be paid minimum wages, weekly offs, and Provident Fund (PF) and Employee State Insurance (ESI) cards.
“Whether it was the Congress government or the Bharatiya Janata Party, both are following policies that favour industrialists at the cost of workers,” Naveen Kumar of Garam Rolla Mazdoor Samiti told the workers.
Other workers narrated that they work between 10 and 12 hours, and still don’t get paid minimum wages or get their salaries on time.
“Factory owners pay around Rs.8,000, when the minimum wages for skilled workers is Rs.10,374. Sometimes we get paid six to seven weeks late and are given Rs.3,000 for the months as kharchi ,” said Sugreev Kumar, a migrant from Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh, who has worked at the Wazirpur hot rolling steel plants since the past eight years.
After discussing their work conditions, the workers took out a procession from Jantar Mantar to the Ministry at Rafi Marg.
The Ministry has announced that it is considering amending central labour laws, including the Industrial Disputes Act, the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, and the Factories Act.
“The conditions the workers are describing are a microcosm of the conditions of work in factories all over the region. There is greater ‘informalisation’ of work even within formal sectors. Workers get neither minimum wages, nor health or social security benefits. In some instances, contractors are paid as per production and they disburse the wages as they like, in some instances contractors are used to make the workers fall in line,” said Prabhu Mohapatra of Delhi University.
Workers from almond processing units in Karawal Nagar also joined the protest meeting.
