The 3 day session of the Working Committee of CITU held at its headquarters, BTR Bhawan, New Delhi concluded today with a clarion call to its affiliates and the working class in general to deploy total organizational strength to ensure a reverberating success of the countrywide General Strike on 7th September 2010. This was the first meeting of the Working Committee presided over by A. K. Padmanabhan and the General Report presented by Tapan Sen, General Secretary both elected at the 13th conference of the CITU held at Chandigarh on 17-21 March 2010. 27 out of 35 Office Bearers and 100 out of 125 Working Committee Members attended the meeting.
A resolution moved by M. K. Pandhe extended full support to the strike call against unprecedented price rise, rampant violation of labour laws, contractorisation of workforce, disinvestment of profit making public sectors and for provision of universal social security for unorganized sector workers. The resolution called upon the entire working class irrespective of affiliations to make the General Strike a massive success and prepare for heightening the united struggle in the days to come for reversal of neo-liberal economic policies pursued by the UPA-II Government.
On Employees’ Pension Scheme 1995 (EPS)
The Working Committee expressed very serious concern at the deplorable state of condition of the EPS. The pensionery benefit has gone down at atrociously low level. At the time introduction of the scheme the Government refused to accept of demand of CITU to link the pension benefit with price index and instead had decided to undertake review at regular interval. But actually no worthy name review to revise the benefit neutralising the rise in prices has taken place at all. The fan fare with which the EPS was imposed on the workers by the Government, now it cannot arrogantly avoid to act with financial contribution to keep the corpus of the EPS viable and ensuring benefit to the senior citizens of the country for a decent retired life. After all it is an all important matter of social security.
The Working Committee has decided to launch massive campaign and propaganda to lend support to exploited EPS beneficiaries and mounting pressure on the Government to come out with financial support to the EPS and also to organize resistance to any apprehended steps by the Government to restructure the scheme in furtherance to the neo-liberal policies causing more economic hardship to the current and future beneficiaries.
Against Privatisatioin, Opening up and Deregulations :
On the continued onslaught of privatization through dinvestment, the Working Committee noted that shares in blue chip PSUs is being carried on and already shares are being off-loaded at a price much below the price ruling in the share market in all cases disinvested so far. The Govt has already entered into free trade agreement with the ASEAN countries and recently similar free trade agreement is being negotiated with the European Union. Both together will mean almost total and unrestricted opening of our market for both industrial and agricultural products from abroad which is going to severely affect the domestic industries and already crisis-ridden agriculture. Hundred per cent FDI in retail trade including multi-brand products is also being actively considered by the Govt.
All these are going to create grievous consequences for the national economy and many more such steps for deregulation of the financial sector are on the anvil as the trend indicates. The ruling polity in India is in a hurry to completely deregulate the national economy and the domestic market to force upon similar opening and deregulation in other developing economies—all to facilitate a quicker recovery of the crisis ridden economies of the rich industrialised nations. The project of strategic alliance of Indian ruling polity with imperialism is in action through such hectic move of deregulation and disinvestments which needs to be understood comprehensively and propagated intensively among the people. The Working Committee decided that in course of the campaign centering round the forthcoming General Strike these issued should be highlighted.
Deregulation of Petroleum Pricing:
The increase in the price of petrol, diesel, LPG and Kerosene as a step towards complete deregulation of petroleum pricing will further aggravate the inflationary situation. The plea taken by the Govt that petrol/diesel/kerosene prices are raised owing to increase in international price of crude oil is totally untrue. Even on date the international price of crude oil, if converted into rupees per litre adding together refining cost and other incidentals is less than half the price of petrol diesel etc at the domestic market. Fact remains that the present high level of prices of petrol and diesel etc is because of heavy tax and duties extracted by the Governments from mass of the people. Whatever little subsidy still being given to people by the Govt in Kerosene and LPG, four times more is being extracted by the govt from the same people in the form of high tax and duties. In fact in case of petroleum products, mass of the common people have in fact subsidising the Govt.
The Working Committee further noted that deregulation of petroleum pricing will be the source of constant increase in prices and more and more burden on the common people in one hand and on the other hand the private operators both indigenous and foreign shall deploy all foul means to derive undue advantage out of the deregulated regime and the oil PSUs shall be put to serious disadvantage threatening commercial viability in the long term. Naturally the trade union movement of country must address this issue with this perspective understanding.
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