Working class of our country is completing the preparations for the General Strike on 8th of January 2020 raising 12 most important demands. This will be the nineteenth general strike called by the joint trade union movement since the introduction of neoliberal 'New Economic Policy' in India in 1991. In the last general strike held on 8th and 9th of 2019 January, 18 crores of workers struck work. Every time the Indian working class renews its own record of participation of most number of workers in strike and makes it revised themselves by every subsequent strike. In addition to that the strike denotes the continuity of the struggles against privatization, globalization and the rightist policies of the Government continuing for the last 29 years. At the same time, the contemporary struggles have a speciality that they are waged against full-fledged fascism.
Since the advent of Modi into power in 2014, Trade Union movements of the country have come together to organize three nation-wide general strikes on September 2nd of 2015, September 2nd of 2016, and 8th and 9th of January 2019. A statement of rights comprising 12 of the most important demands was placed before the government and it was on the basis of these demands the strikes were called for. The oncoming general strike of January 8 is the continuation of workers' struggles like the Mahapadav(SIT IN DEMONSTRATION BEFORE PARLIAMENT) held before the parliament on 9th, 10th and 11th of November 2017, strike and Parliament March of the scheme workers on 17th of January 2018, joined convention of workers in 2019 and strikes and struggles of employees and workers of banking and insurance sectors, of Harbor, mining and airlines. Experiences of recent struggles like the strike of Ordnance factory workers from 20th of August 2019, against the corporatization and privatization of Ordnance industries, mining workers strike on 24th of September, bank employees strike on 22nd of October, strike of workers and employees of petroleum sector on 28th November are there in the background of the present general strike. The agrarian struggles of the recent times started with the Mandsaur peasants struggle in Madhya Pradesh where 6 peasants were shot dead by the police in 2017 and spread across the country with the Maharashtra peasants long March in which more than 40000 peasants participated are also there to share the general orientation of the strike. The general atmosphere of struggle prevailing in the whole country in association with the students' struggles in JNU, Jamia Millia and other universities is spreading to other areas also.
Introduction of the National Register of Citizenship (NRC) has created a situation in which millions of people belonging to minority communities would be driven out of their homes and neighborhood and compelled to live in modern prisons or detention centers. People all over the country are struggling against this and a burning situation is created in the capital also. Various kinds of agitations and struggles are going on in various sectors on the basis of various demands and slogans and the particular feature which makes the workers' strike different from other struggles is the national character of it uniting all the working people from the Cape to the Himalayas.
Under the Modi regime which is very much keen to sabotage the very constitution itself, all the labor laws have lost their protection. In 2014, immediately after coming to power, they amended the factories act, labor relations act and apprentice act. Because of these amendments some 70% of workers were thrown out of the list of permanent workers. Employers have obtained the facility to retrench any number of workers and to lock out factories as they wish. Facility for appointing apprentices at a wage rate lower than that of contract laborers was also obtained to them. Subsequent actions from the part of Modi Government have made the Trade Union Act of 1926, Industrial Employment Standing Order Act of 1946, Industrial Dispute Act of 1948 and the Contract Labor Abolition Act of 1970 irrelevant in effect.
The wage code and the social security code, formulated by integrating various labor acts and passed by the parliament in 2019 July are going to be in force without delay. When the labor rules and labor-health safety rules will get enforced, the very existence of rule of law will be compelled to face extreme challenges.
It was in this background that the convention of Central Trade Union organisations held on 30th of September 2019 at the Parliament Marg New Delhi demanded the revision and withdrawal of the destructive policies and practices in labor and employment sector. The convention called for the national strike on 8th January.
What the labour sector and the creators of all wealth, the working class face today is nothing but all-out offensive from the part of rulers and the finance capital. The government seems to be committed to ensure the effective plunder by the corporate forces and the measures employed for that are utilized for the suppression of effective demand. Recession in the field of production and price rise are severe. When we take the latest available price index into account the demand of a minimum wage of Rs.21000/- is fully justifiable. We have put forward the demand of ensuring a minimum pension of Rs.10000/- utilizing the government funding also. It is further demanded to extend the area of implementation of employment guarantee scheme beyond the rural limits by incorporating city and town areas also. Other demands include the increase of general investment to resolve the economic collapse of rural and agrarian sectors, governmental action to ensure the procurement of grains produced by farmers ensuring a fair procurement price, writing off of loan liabilities of farmers, ensuring of employment and it's permanency, inclusion of scheme employees in workers' schedule, making the contract workers permanent, ensuring equal pay for equal work, immediate governmental measures to resolve the increasing unemployment and price rise etc. Instead of paying attention to the workers' demands, what the central government is trying to do is to divide the people through communal programs and to destabilize the country itself.
As we all know none of the demands put forward by the Trade Union organisations are new. From 1991 itself, that is from the time of commencement of the implementation of neo liberal economic policies itself we were struggling for the achievement of the above said demands. The government is trying to break our struggles and agitations by buying BMS, the Trade Union which had allied with us previously in our joint struggles. Now, the BMS Union tries to make some splits and holes in the struggling workers front like the cowardly character of the legend, Utharan who ran away from the war-front.
TUCI declares its wholehearted solidarity with the general strike of the Indian working class on January 8th of 2020 on the basis of the most important demands and all other struggles and agitations for achieving those demands and with the related declaration of Central Trade Unions. It is quite important to see that the said declaration of Central Trade Unions has put forward the demands to protect the interests of peasantry and other masses of people along with that of the workers. It is known that the peasant organisations also are going to start their struggles in Delhi, the capital of India. Various students' organisations also have declared their solidarity with those struggles. Over and above all the struggles for achieving partly demands, it's the struggle stressing up on the axis of worker peasant alliance that determines the course of India to the future.
