Karnataka - Bangalore

Contract workers in construction industry hit

Bangalore: That the construction industry is in the grip of a severe recession is a known fact. But the plight of the contract and casual workers, who are neither offered protection to life and limb nor security of tenure, is less readily appreciated. This section appears to be bearing the brunt of the ongoing recession. About 450 workers, employed by ACC (formerly Associated Cement Companies Ltd.) through a contactor, were fired over two months. They recently staged a two-day dharna before the office of the Labour Commissioner in Bangalore, demanding that they be reinstated.

The dharna ended after the management promised to enter into negotiations to end the deadlock in conciliation proceedings before the commissioner on Tuesday.

ACC has five ready mix concrete units in the city, with a total capacity of about 50,000 cubic metres of concrete a month. The units, which are at Whitefield, Bommasandra, Peenya, Yelahanka and on Mysore Road, employ about 450 workers. Mostly migrants from across the country, they are employed as drivers, khalasis, welders, pump operators and supervisors, who are involved in the process of making and supplying ready-to-use concrete at construction sites in the city. H.N. Gopala Gowda, President, Karnataka Ready mix Concrete Workers’ Union, which is affiliated to the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), told The Hindu that ACC workers are among the few that are unionised in the city.

A senior ACC source in Mumbai told The Hindu the company did not employ the workers “directly”. “ACC has not fired these workers, they were employed by a sub-contractor whose contract with the company was cancelled,” he said. The company, he said, had tried to assume “moral responsibility” for the situation and tried to “work out a severance package for the workers” that was “way above what was legally binding” on the company.

The company source also said demand for cement concrete was falling because of the recessionary conditions and that the company would reopen the units when the situation improved. Ayaz Hussain, a union activist, said the company, on October 22, informed the workers through their contractor that they need not report to work the following day. The nature of contractual employment, he said, “makes it possible for the company to pretend that it has no relationship with us even though many of us have worked continuously with the company for over ten years.”

Although the workers are technically not employed by ACC, most of them at the dharna were wearing jackets which bore the company logo.

“If market conditions were so bad, why did the company open a new facility on Mysore Road in May 2008?” he asked. He said the prolonged boom in construction had resulted in companies making “super profits” in the last decade. “For the company to claim that it has to close down without paying a fair compensation to the workers is patently unfair,” he said.

S. Meenakshi Sundaram, Secretary, CITU State Committee, said there were about 30,000 workers employed in ready mix concrete units in the city. None of these workers are eligible for benefits from the Building and Other Construction Workers’ Welfare Board.

Mr. Gopala Gowda said: “The company is using the recession as a pretext to throw workers out on the streets.” The union had successfully negotiated two wage settlements with the management in the last six years. “The company is now trying to reduce costs by throwing out its entire workforce so that it can later hire workers at much lower pay,” he alleged.

G. Murugan (36), who has been working for over ten years for ACC, lost his left arm in an accident in 1999 while cleaning a concrete pump. V. Venkatesh (27) lost his right arm in a similar accident. Both alleged elementary safety precautions were not taken, which resulted in the accidents. “We were asked to clean the pump with our hands instead of using proper equipment,” Murugan said. Both workers were not paid any compensation either by the contractor or the company.

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