They complain of injustice, harassment by management
Workers of the Aequs Special Economic Zone on Pune-Bengaluru NH4 near Hattargi, about 30 km from here, staged a protest in Belagavi on Wednesday against the ‘injustice’ meted out to them.
The workers, along with their family members, including children, took out a procession under the banner of Krantikari Kamagar Union-Aequs Pvt.Ltd. (SEZ) Unit and Trade Union Centre of India (TUCI) in the city before marching to the Deputy Commissioner’s office. TUCI State Secretary K.B. Gonal, KKU President Sanjeev Patil and Secretary Maddappa Kondagolli said around 300 workers, serving as operators in various sections at the SEZ on contract, had been removed without valid reasons. They said the “anti-worker” decisions of the management began in September last when the workers formed the union. They alleged that the police and services of goonda elements were used to threaten, harass and use force on them. Subsequently criminal cases were booked against nearly 200 workers.
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Mr. Gonal said the jurisdictional headquarters of SEZs in Karnataka, Kerala and Mahe was located at Kochi in Kerala and was inconvenient for the issues related with the SEZs in Karnataka. The Chief Minister should make efforts to relocate the headquarters to Karnataka considering the fact that the State was industrially much larger than Kerala. The Chief Minister should personally intervene and direct the management of Aequs SEZ to reinstate all the workers and ask the police to withdraw illegally framed criminal cases against them at the earliest, he added.