On January 5, a new union was born: the Maruti Suzuki Non-permanent Workers Sangh, marking a unique event in the history of working class struggles and the trade union movement.
The union was an initiative by dismissed permanent workers of Maruti Suzuki an act of solidarity by those who had no jobs, or incomes and more importantly, without the support of major trade unions.
I was present on the occasion as an observer.
The members of Maruti Suzuki Sangharsh Committee were permanent workers who had been dismissed by the company in 2012 in violation of labour laws. Since then, these workers had kept up their fight for their jobs as well as the non-permanent workers.
The Sangharsh, or struggle, committee had booked a place in old Gurgaon and were not expecting more than a hundred people. But by 11.30 am, more than a thousand had turned with the numbers swelling to over 3,000.
In the sea of the faces of young men, none was above the age of 30. Many had mobile phones to record the speeches of the trade union leaders. Their eyes were fixed on the speaker as they followed every word, nodding in agreement, a shadow of anguish on their faces as he spoke of their pain followed by an outburst of clapping to support every suggestion for future struggles.
The Sangharsh Committee has been on a dharna, or demonstration, since September 18. The focus has been on the permanent workers getting their jobs or compensation for wrongful dismissal, but the committee has also continued to take up the demands of the non-permanent workers at Maruti Suzuki plants in Gurgaon and Manesar. The leaflets, pamphlets and posters they have been publishing since the beginning of the protest reflects this solidarity. It is a part of the history of the Maruti-Suzuki workers’ struggles since 2011 when the company increasingly began employing contract workers.
After the protest and subsequent violence in July 2012, in which a manager was killed and more than 100 workers were arrested, the Maruti Suzuki management abolished the contract labour system. This was replaced by a diabolical system of contractual workers or fixed-term employment. The management tried to break this solidarity between permanent and non-permanent workers by increasing the wages of the permanent workers to Rs 1,30,000 while non-permanent workers get less than half or even less for the same work.
The increase in the wages of permanent workers did not come from the profits the company made but from depriving 83% of the workforce of permanent jobs. The number of permanent workers at the Maruti Suzuki plants is just 17% and the remaining 83,000 workers are non-permanent, earning between Rs 12,000 to maximum of Rs 30,000.
This difference in wages has been justified by creating various categories of workers: apprentice, temporary worker 1, 2 and 3, casual worker C1 and C2, and then the MST – multi-skilled technician. The management also controlled the union of permanent workers, because the union does not represent the interests of non-permanent workers.
The Sangharsh Committee had been researching the condition of non-permanent workers and discovered that there are over 30,000 men who worked as non-permanent workers but were never made permanent.
Already, the Sangharsh Committee had raised various demands on behalf of the non-permanent workers working within the factory. The demand letter, sent to the labour commissioner, was read out at the meeting by Surendra Kaushik, a member of the Sangharsh Committee.
After that, Amit Chakroborty, a trade union leader who has been working with Maruti Suzuki workers since 2012, read out a letter of demands on behalf of all non-permanent workers. One of the demands is for Maruti Suzuki to hire workers for its new factory at Kharkhoda in Sonipat from this pool of 30,000 workers who have worked with the company. But the most basic demand, rooted in principes of natural justice and embedded in labour law, is equal pay for equal work.
The non-permanent workers do the same work – several stations do not have any permanent workers – after barely weeks of training but are paid a pittance. After seven months – one year in case of the apprentice and two years in case of the multi-skilled technician – the temporary worker (TW 1, 2, 3) is thrown out and another set of temporary workers are hired for seven months.
Several workers told their stories and said that Maruti Suzuki had sucked joy out of their lives and trampled on their dreams of getting a job. A worker from Jharkhand had got a job as TW 1 in 2017. He was fired after seven months. After a few months, he was recalled, this time as a TW2 but was fired again after seven months. The third time, he was asked to join as a TW3. He thought he would be made permanent and finally be able to support his family, which lived in extreme poverty in a mud house. But his hopes were dashed and he is now unemployed.
Another worker said that he got married but when he did not get a permanent job, he cried outside the Maruti factory gates. But now, he stood straight and said he was ready to fight for his right to a job.
Khushi Ram, a member of the Sangharsh Committee who has been protesting since September, said that they would support the struggles of the non-permanent workers but they themselves had to fight their battle. They would have to speak for themselves before the labour commissioner on January 10, Ram said, to loud applause in agreement.
What about the government?
The Centre and automobile industry representatives formulated the Automotive Mission Plan for 2047, aimed at paving the way for India to become an advanced industrial power.
The Automotive Mission Plan 2016-’26, outlining the vision of the Indian government and the Indian automobile industry, promised to create 65 million direct and indirect jobs over the next decade. But this plan neglected to mention that the jobs would not be permanent and would often pay below statutory minimum wages. The most dangerous deception is firing and rehiring a worker – as a TW1 for seven months and then re-employed after four months as TW2 and finally dismissed and hired again as TW3 – is counted as creating three jobs.
The dismissed permanent workers have invited non-permanent workers to join their protest till January 10. They have provided the non-permanent workers basic shelter under a bamboo structure, shared their food and are teaching them the basics of union politics. They have made it clear that the struggle is entirely peaceful and not in violation of any law.
But who will discipline transnational companies that have no respect for the laws of the land and even less for the people?
These non-permanent workers are not revolutionaries seeking change in society – all they want is a decent job to support their families. Is that too much to ask for in a country about to celebrate Republic Day, marking the Constitution coming into effect with the promise that the government would be run for people?
Nandita Haksar is the co-author along with Anjali Deshpande of Japanese Management Indian Resistance: The Struggle of the Maruti Suzuki Workers Speaking Tiger, 2023.