The 7 conference of the Madurai urban unit of Centre of Indian Trade Unions began here with a call to unite the working class to protect the natural wealth of the country from being enjoyed by the few corporate giants.
Delivering the inaugural address of the three-day meet here on Tuesday, its State general secretary, A. Soundarajan, said that while the working class was losing its labour rights on the other hand a few corporates that dictated its might over the official machinery was trying to loot country’s natural wealth. He said pointed out the cases of coal mining, attempts to disinvest Government shares in public sector companies, and the huge loss incurred in allocation of 2G spectrum. “Besides enjoying all benefits under the Government administration, the corporates were trying to seek additional benefits to cater to their avarice,” he said.
He alleged that cartelisation led to the recent auction of 2G spectrum not evoking the expected response. The criticised the ruling Congress party for trying to show that no irregularity had taken place in the 2G spectrum allocation. The MLA said that country like India should encourage self-employment to overcome the unemployment problem, whereas the Government was trying to wipe out the retail business that gave job opportunities to four crore people by allowing foreign direct investment. The claim of Congress that FDI in retail will create six crore job opportunities and also help farmers get good price for their produce had no truth. He appealed to the working class to unite and strengthen their associations to keep its fight to sustain the benefits through the welfare board. While the State and Centre were boasting of bringing in new industries, those units were not complying with the established labour laws. At a time when the unions were fighting to fix higher minimum wages in the unorganised sector, the new industrial units were not paying the minimum wages at the existing rates, he said.
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CITU State president, R. Singaravelu, State secretary, B. Vikraman, State deputy secretary, R. Karumalayan, district president, R. Deivaraj, district secretary, V. Pitchai, spoke.