By Dr. Gyan Pathak
Prime Minister Narendra Modi led government has resorted to go offensive afresh against Trade Unionism in India. Reconstitution of the Central Board of Trustees (CBT) of the retirement fund body Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) amply demonstrate it. Three members are given place into it from Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, an organization of the RSS-BJP family, while three from Trade Unions that have been continuously opposing anti-labour policies of the Union Government are kicked out from the CBT. Two seats are kept intentionally vacant, out of 10 to complete the Board, as per the legal provisions.
The members who were excluded were from Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC), All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC), and All India United Trade Union Centre (AIUTUC), which had seats allocated to them in the previous body, constituted last in November 2018. The CBT is constituted for five years with 10 employees’ representatives, who are essentially part of trade unions.
The newly constituted CBT’s other five members are one each from Hind Mazdoor Sabha, Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), Trade Union Co-ordination Centre, Self-Employed Women’s Association, and National Front of Indian Trade Unions. In the CBT constituted in 2018, there were 3 members from BMS, 1 from CITU, 1 from AITUC, 1 from Hind Mazdoor Sabha (HMS), 1 from AIUTUC, and three posts vacant meant for INTUC. Even though the November 2018 constituted CBT notification had mentioned three vacant positions from INTUC, the present notification of 2024 mentions only two vacant posts but is silent on for which trade union the posts are vacant..
Politically speaking, among the Trade Unions kept out from the CBT, AITUC is affiliated from Communist Party of India, AIUTUC affiliated to the Socialist Unity Centre of India (Communist), and INTUC is affiliated to Indian National Congress. These Trade Unions have been on the forefront in opposing PM Modi’s four controversial labour codes passed in the Parliament of India in 2019 and 2020.
Under the joint platform of the 10 Central Trade Unions, they participated in numerous demonstration and a few all India strike actions since 2020, alleging that PM Modi’s labour codes, if implemented would lead to modern day slavery for workers. It is due to stiff resistance of the Central Trade Unions (CTUs) that the implementation of the labour codes have been deferred, and the Union government has announced that the codes will soon be implemented.
CTUs believe that in case of PM Narendra Modi returning to power after Lok Sabha Election 2024, the codes would be rolled out since the majority of the states are ready with their codes and the Union Minister of Labour and Employment is pushing for ironing out differences and contradictions in them before they would be implemented pan-India simultaneously. Fearing this, CTUs along with SKM, the umbrella organization of farmers unions, Banks and Insurance unions and other workers organizations have already started campaign against BJP and PM Narendra Modi, with the slogan “Save India, Oust Modi”. Kicking out the CTUs representatives from CBT is view as retaliation from the Union Government.
General Secretary of the AITUC, Amarjeet Kaur has said that they had suggested to re-nominate AITUC’s existing member, Sukumar Damle, on the board, but unfortunately his name has not been included. She has objected the way three names were asked by the government so that they can select one of them. We were told that an individual cannot server more than two terms but Damle has served only one term. There was no ground for ineligibility.
CBT is a tripartite, statutory body, constituted by Centre under EPF and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952 which includes representatives from employees, employers, and the government. The membership size of the trade unions determines which unions will be included in the Board and how many seats will be allocated to each of the represented unions.
The government does this on the membership of unions last determined in 2002, according to which INTUC and AITUC emerged as the second and third largest unions in the country after the RSS-BJP linked BMS. BJP was ruling the Centre at that time. Though the latest data are available for 2013, in which BMS is far behind INTUC, but PM Modi led government is sticking 22 years old data, only to favour its own BMS that supports the government. According to the 2013 data, INTUC members were double than that of BMS, while AITUC has third largest member only little less than BMS.
General Secretary of INTUC Sanjay Singh has said, “We strongly oppose the exclusion of INTUC from the Board. We represent millions of workers and to exclude us means the government has excluded workers’ voices. Trade unions have been demanding that the government carry out a fresh referendum to determine membership of each organisation.”
In the meantime, the Joint Central Trade Unions Platform has written a letter to the Minister of Labour and Employment, expressing their disapproval of the discriminatory and disproportionate representation of unions in the Board.
IndustriALL Global Union, to which INTUC is affiliated, has condemned the exclusion of Trade Union’s representatives. Apoorva Kaiwar, the regional Secretary of South Asia has said, “IndustriALL condemns the consistent weakening of tripartite mechanisms by Indian government. We firmly stand with our affiliates in their struggle against the government’s arbitrary decision regarding the EPFO reorganising.” (IPA Service)
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