NEW DELHI: While Finance Minister P. Chidamabaram astutely stonewalled the demands of the trade unions during a recent meeting, Prime Minister H.D, Deve Gowda, who met TU representatives on June 24, managed to do quite the same, After a 45minute meeting on Monday afternoon, Mr. Deve Gowda’s assurances were mainly built around his Government being “pro worker,””

However, on the major issue of privatization of public sector undertakings, virulently opposed by the TUs, the Prime Minister’s assurance kept open an oblique loophole that “extreme circumstances” may dictate such measures, which he illustrated with an example from his home State.

Al the end of the meeting, TU participants said, they returned with largely “noncommittal” response from the Prime Minister, and a senior TU activist said, “We will know his mind only when the Budget is announced.” The main result of the meeting was that a comprehensive bill on agricultural labor will be soon considered by the Union Cabinet.

Twenty four TU leaders representing to organizations held the meeting with Mr. Deve Gowda, in which the Prime Minister reiterated his Government’s commitment to fulfill labor’s agenda as mentioned in the United Front’s common minimum program, The principal demand was “Immediate revival” of sick PSUs, with budgetary provisions for the same, with the Government functioning as an active promoter, They also demanded that these PSUs be kept out of the purview of BIFR and the SICA Act, and fill their revival package was finalized, the Government continue to provide non plan support along with working capital to maintain operations. Workers representation in management, in both the private and public sector, was also demanded.

The urea scam also came up indirectly, with the TUs pointing out that if eight fertilizer units, which were “totally neglected,” had been functioning, scope for such an import related scandal may not have arisen, according to CITU secretary Tapan Sen, who represented the CPI(M) affiliated TU in the discussions.

They also demanded that the loans to subsidiaries of the National textile Corporation in West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat be written off.

Mr. Deve Gowda told the trade union leaders that one of his government’s top priorities was to generate more and more employment so that poverty was effectively tackled.

Article extracted from this publication >>  June 26, 1996