Wage agreement: deadlock continues in Tirupur

No end in sight though owners and trade unions ease stance

The owners of the stainless steel utensils production units and the trade unions in Anupparapalayam utensils cluster eased their respective stances but the deadlock continues in reaching the new wage pact for the workers in the sector.

Wage accord

The trade unions, during the talks held with the unit owners in the presence of Labour Department officials on Monday evening, came down from their demand for a 65 per cent increase in wages from the previous wage accord that ended in December, and settled for a 30 per cent increase.

Similarly, the owners said they were ready to raise the wages by 17 per cent though they were standing firm on a 15 per cent increase during the previous rounds of talks that had been held.

R. Senthil, a trade unionist who took part in the talks representing Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, told

The Hindu that the next round of talks was scheduled for March 20.

“The trade unions will have to resort to agitation if consensus cannot be reached quickly even after we reduced the scale of increase,” he said.

The wage agreement for workers involved in the brass and copper vessels in the cluster had been signed with an increase of 33.5 per cent in the recent weeks.

However, the wage pact for the predominant stainless steel segment in the utensils cluster could not be resolved and the strike by the workers in the sector entered the 50th day on Tuesday.