Hero MotoCorp union leaders plan hunger strike for higher wages

NEW DELHI: Situation can worsen at Hero MotoCorp’s troubled Gurgaon plant as workers seeking higher wages are considering to go the ‘Anna way’ with an indefinite hunger strike within the factory premises if their demands are not met.
Even as talks are being held to resolve the issue that has been hanging fire since August last year, resentment amongst the workers is growing and there is a sense that something “concrete” needs to be done to make the management agree to demands, some of the workers briefed on the move told TOI, though wishing anonymity “The management is just not ready to agree to our demands and this is not acceptable to us.Our patience is wearing out and our union leaders will go on an indefinite hunger strike, just like activist Anna Hazare, if the matter is not resolved soon,” the workers — involved in the wage negotiations with the management — said.
The management of Hero MotoCorp has, however, said it cannot be “coerced into decisions governed by pressure tactics”. “Hero MotoCorp has always given top priority to the overall welfare and well-being of all our workers... And we will strive to reach at a reasonable, sustainable and sensible settlement,” a company spokesperson had said earlier. The two sides have been negotiating a fresh wage settlement over the last six months, but so far it has not yielded any results. The workers are understood to be asking for an increment of between Rs 15,000 and Rs 18,000 (over a three-year period), much higher than the Rs 6,500 increment given to workers at the bike major's Dharuhera plant in 2011.
Gurgaon’s labour union leaders justify the demand for higher increment, saying that cost of living is higher in the city which is part of the National Capital Region (NCR).
The workers said that they will now make it clear it to the management that they cannot be holding the talks in perpetuity, and a decision has to be taken soon. “This is the reason that the hunger strike is being contemplated,” one of them said. Hero MotoCorp management, however, is not very keen to give a fatter increment to workers at Gurgaon as it might spoil its wage settlement at Dharuhera and lead to similar demands from labour union leaders there. The workers at the Gurgaon plant, who had reduced production temporarily to press for their demands, are still maintaining the output.
However, union leaders have threatened that this may not continue for long if their demands are not met. “If they do not agree to the increment levels suggested by us, we will have to go on strike,” Kanwalpreet Singh, president of Hero MotoCorp's Gurgaon labour union, had told TOI recently. The Gurgaon plant has a daily average output of around 7,000 units. It employs about 1,200 permanent workers and about 4,000 casual.