The Crisis is Upon Us

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The Crisis is Upon Us

Vol - XLVIII No. 26-27, J une 29, 2013 | Ranjana Padhi [1]Web Exclusives[2]Bibtex [3] Endnote [4] RIS [5] Google Scholar [6]

2013-06-28Maruti Suzuki, Labour, Kaithal, Haryana

On 19 May in Kaithal, the Haryana police and government let loose brutal violence andrepression against workers and their families led by the Maruti Suzuki Workers Union. The mightof corporate India with the government as its agent was on full display even as the corporatemedia chose to ignore the entire episode.

Ranjana Padhi ([email protected] [7]) is an activist and writer based in Delhi.

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When workers rise up to demand their legitimate rights as guaranteed in the Indian Constitutionand protest against a corporate entity like Maruti Suzuki, they become criminals and cease to bebonafide citizens in the eyes of the state; they even cease to be voters for the otherwisevote-hungry politicians. It is no longer a matter of the state and its administration being inperpetual limbo; they wield their power to criminalise the working class to aid global capital.Workers and their struggles and the brutal repression by the state even cease to be anews-story for the corporate media as such events are blacked out. What happened at Kaithal

bears testimony to this and is the reason for this commentary.

The long and intense struggle of the workers of the Maruti Suzuki plant in Manesar, Haryanawas the assertion of collective bargaining for the right to register a trade union fulfilling all normsas stipulated by the Trade Union Act. Moreover, last years conflict of J uly 18 happened right inthe middle of discussions on wage revisions that the Maruti Suzuki Workers Union (MSWU) washolding with the management. The incident led to the termination of 546 permanent and 1800contract workers by the company, confinement of 147 workers in the Bhondsi jail in Haryanaand 66 nonbailable warrants. The management and the Haryana police and administrationsquarely blamed the workers for the death of the human resources (HR) manager much beforeinvestigations were over. [1]Therefore, it is only the workers who have been demanding an

independent inquiry into the death of the manager.

Ever since this death, the vibrant struggle of the MSWU gathered both momentum and supportacross Haryana and the country. One reason is that the union adopted a wide range ofdemocratic and peaceful means of protest such as appeals, petitions, litigation, marches, cyclerallies, sending of delegations and hunger strikes. All these means of protest form the basicdemocratic right of workers as guaranteed in the Constitution. However, in an act of brazencowardice and use of authority, a democratically elected government resorted to brutalrepression. What was being planned in Kaithal with much hard work and labour of the MSWUand the local panchayats and what was done to scuttle it by the State has grave implications

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not only for the rights of the Maruti workers but also the entire working class move ent in thiscountry.

Fear of Popular Support

The Haryana Industries and Commerce Minister, Randip Singh Surjewala has his residence inKaithal. A majority of workers too hail from Kaithal and surrounding districts like J ind andKarnal. Entire communities of the vast region supported the workers at the dharna that began

on 24 March with donations of wheat, oil, sugar, vegetables and by their sheer presence in largenumbers. To stem the growing support of the communities around, government authority and itsuse of fiscal powers was directed against its own local leadership. The local newspapersmentioned that the Haryana government was planning to hold back the grants of 85 localpanchayats that had participated in the protest event of 8 May .

The administration therefore was well aware of the Mahapanchayat that had been called for on19 May. Preparations had been on for weeks for this great day. An estimated 10, 000 peoplewere expected from the villages around Kaithal that morning. The workers had asked the theminister to respond to their demands by 19 May.The discussion on the demands was pendingsince March 24 and therefore the workers continued the peaceful dharna at the Mini Secretariat,

which is the office of the Deputy Commissioner/District Magistrate. Instead of coming forward fora discussion, Section 144 was declared from 5 pm on May 18 untilmidnight of the next day.Around 11.45 pm, the police swooped down on the area and arrested 91 people of whom 89were workers and two were trade union activists. Many were asleep.Another four workers werearrested on the morning of May 19. The dharna site was taken over by the police andbelongings of the workers were removed too.

Arrested and Disappeared

Kaithal was under siege the next day. Tension was rife with police jeeps and vans swarmingacross large stretches from the main bus stand and the railway station to the Mini Secretariat

and from the entry points on the state highway to Surjewalas residence. A six-member teamfrom the Association for Democratic Right (AFDR) Punjab, the Peoples Union for Civil Rights(PUCR), Haryana, the Peoples Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) Delhi and the New TradeUnion Initiative (NTUI) Delhi, spent a few hours trying to figure out the charges under whichthose picked up the previous night had been detained. The team was shunted from the KaithalCivil Line station to the Police Civil Lines to the office of the superintendent of police (SP) in theMini Secretariat building. However no information was forthcoming. The basic right of ademocratic rights organisation or a family member to be informed of the charges under which aworker has been booked therefore seemed to hold little significance. The team was told morethan once that the SP and the DSP were at the site of the dharna or at the entry points to thetown. It was when the 95 arrested were produced in court and escorted to jail that it was

revealed they had been booked under Section 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated bypublic servant), which in this case was the violation of Section 144. Surely, such simpleinformation can be shared with democratic rights activists and anxious families and fellowworkers. Almost every local resident spoken to expressed shock at the arrest of the 95 workersthe previous night. What was the fear that had gripped the custodians of law and order? Wherewere these orders coming from? It was perhaps an omen of what was to follow.

That afternoon the police were chasing away people at the entry points to the town and, in turn,the small team of rights activists was determined to chase the police and figure out thewhereabouts of the 95 arrested. The marchers slowly gathering in number were determined tomake it to the residence of the minister. At 43 degrees the heat was near unbearable but the


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endless chase continued. Section 144 was was being openly defied by the people pouring intothe town to join the protest in small and big groups. Busloads of detained protestors wereshouting Mazdoor Ekta Zindabaad! Zindabaad, Zindabaad! There were women in the busestoo. Till almost late evening, the police never bothered to share where those being picked upwere being detained. Despite the entry points to Kaithal being blocked and protestors beingturned away, a few hundred people gathered and were stopped on the road leading to theministers residence. Workers and their families were ready to face anything. And they did.

Barricades were put up and there was heavy deployment of police in riot gear with lathis etc.Water canons and tear gas were kept in readiness. Workers and their leaders spoke andreaffirmed their commitment to get the terminated workers reinstated as well as the 147 inBhondsi jail released. However, the demand for the release of the 95 arrested the previous nightgrew in intensity. The pradhans of the panchayats unanimously demanded the withdrawal ofthe case and the release of the 95. The demand for the return of the detained workers was alsocoming from communities that were questioning corporate power for the first time. It was theirchildren in jail. The struggle of labour against capital that is truly worldwide seemed tomomentarily take a disturbing turn as a speaker passionately invoked the Haryana identity:Laundehamare Haryana kehai; koi Pakistan kenahin! (These boys are ours and not fromPakistan). The few khap panchayats and largely elected panchayats directed their wrath at the

Haryana government. Indeed, the mood was electric; the demand was for their boys to bebrought to the dharna spot. The DSP stationed at the barricades, protected by a shield, becamethe only point of contact. All the speakers denounced the high-handedness of the Hoodaregime in Haryana. The anger and the disbelief were palpable. Workers and their familiesrefused to leave the spot until those arrested the previous night were brought to them.

Act of Coward ice

Perhaps the defiance of Section 144 by women and children and the elderly who had gatheredthere sent a chill down the spine of the state. Or maybe the unity and rising crescendo of thevoice of the workers families frightened the police.Around 6 pm, the police started using the

water cannons and bursting tear gas shells without any warning. Two shots were fired in theair. The workers had started pushing against the police barricades to continue the march. Thepolice warned everyone to leave within 10 minutes but when that did not happen, the lathicharge started. Many workers, women and the eldersly were mercilessly caned sustainingsever injuries. A policewoman was heard severely reprimanding a senior officer why the womenpolice had been summoned at all, if the former were going to beat up the women. Many of theinjured were admitted to the government hospital. Six women were detained till late night whilethe names of three of them are Mentioned in the first information report (FIR).

Eleven people were arrested under the Arms Act and Section 307 (attempt to murder). Thenumber of Maruti workers in the jails of Haryana shot up from 147 to 258. Ironically, although

the administration imposed Section 144 on the town, it allowed two other processions the sameday. One was by the Haryana J anhit Congress and the other by the Brahmin Samaj on theoccasion of Parshuram J ayanti. The latter was addressed by Surjewala who had no time for theworkers. Interestingly, not a single journalist was present to cover such a momentous protestand the heavy police repression that followed. Evidently this does not constitute news for thecorporate media. The only two cameras at work were those of the police. TheTimes of Indiacame wrapped with a full page advertisement of Maruti claiming that it was capturing thenational spirit of change by empowering the "I" (meaning the citizens of India).

The ingenuity of capital and state in the neo-liberal paradigm is manifest in the series of swift


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and sure undemocratic actions against workers across the Manesar-Gurgaon industrial elt andin the entire national capital region.

An Awakening

The struggle of the MSWU is not simply a revival of the trade union movement at one of itsbleakest moments in history. It is an awakening of an entire new generation of workers thatdares to question the coercion and violence of capitalist development. The Haryana

governments response to just demands with such brutal violence and arrests has madecriminals of workers who make the cars the privileged drive and whose back breaking labourcontributes to the national hysteria of growth. It is precisely at this time that the Constitutioncan be shaken and rattled to see if there remains today any vestige of rights for workers andcitizens who question global capital. And the states cowardice is actually the response ofcorporate India in sheer panic. There is no impending macro-economic crisis; this is the crisis.

[1] See PUDR Report Driving Force: Labour Struggles and Violation of Rights in Maruti SuzukiIndia Limited (May 2013) at http://www.pudr.org/?q=content/driving-force-labour-struggles-and-violat... [8]

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[1] http://www.epw.in/authors/ranjana-padhi[2] http://www.epw.in/web-exclusive[3] http://www.epw.in/bibtex/75431[4] http://www.epw.in/endnote/75431[5] http://www.epw.in/ris/75431[6] http://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_q=The+Crisis+is+Upon+Us&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&

as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=Ranjana+Padhi&as_publication=%22Economic+and+Political+Weekly%22&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=[7] mailto:[email protected][8] http://www.pudr.org/?q=content/driving-force-labour-struggles-and-violation-rights-maruti-suzuki-india-limited


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The Crisis is Upon Us