CITU protest against move to amend Factories Act

In a statement, CITU State president A Soundararajan and general secretary G Sugumaran called upon its members to expose the Centre’s ulterior motive by holding a placard and raising slogans in front of their houses for five minutes at 10.30 am on Tuesday.

They said that the Centre has extended the nationwide curfew which was imposed on March 24 from April 4 to May 3 to prevent the spread of the COVID-19. “Rather than coming to the rescue of the workers who were hit by the double whammy of economic slowdown and COVID-19 curfew, the Centre was keen on protecting the corporates by attempting to increase the daily working hours from eight hours to 12 hours, salary cut and job losses. The Centre has come out with various announcements to benefit the corporate sectors which had witnessed a drop in profits but failed to protect the livelihood of the workers,” they said.

The CITU leaders said that the Centre has not provided any financial benefits to the workers in the unorganised sectors and migrant workers.

In a letter to the Chief Minister, the CITU leaders sought his intervention to get salary for workers whose companies were closed following the curfew. Few companies like sugarcane crushing mill at Thiruvannamalai, a thermal power station of Tangedco, Chemplast at Mettur and HIL were refusing to pay salary to the workers, he said, adding that the workers at The Nilgiri tea estates did not get their wages for the curfew period.

He also urged the Chief Minister to hold talks with his counterparts to arrange vehicles for the transport of the migrant workers to their respective States with the partial lifting of the curfew from April 20.