Suzuki is having two plants in India to produce cars. Both of these are situated near Delhi, in Haryana state. On Wednesday, workers at Manesar plant got agitated after an official of the company, who was a supervisor, got into an argument with them. This led to heated arguments and thereafter work was stopped. Soon, senior officers of Human Resources Department of the company were called to negotiate with the workers. However, during the talks, workers became violent and started beating the officials present in the meeting as well as elsewhere in the factory campus. Workers used everything that they could find to thrash the officers. Iron rods, chains etc were freely used. Property was damaged and vehicles and other assets were burnt. But the violence did not stop there. A senior officer of HR Department of the company, A K Dev, who was talking to workers, was beaten badly and then burnt alive. Many other officials were thrashed and now have been hospitalized. These include some Japanese officers.
Suzuki’s this plant was also in news last year when workers went on a very long strike which caused huge losses to the company. Their demand at that time was to recognize the new union of workers. At that time, company decided to move out of Haryana state which is infamous for its violent labour problems and to move to Gujrat, a highly developed, progressive state where Tata and other automobile manufacturers have set up their plants.
Suzuki is the number one automobile company in India in terms of number of cars sold and revenue earned and it is way ahead of its rivals Hyundai and Tata who are nowhere near Suzuki’s standing. More than 40 per cent of cars sold in India are from Suzuki stable.
Suzuki stated that its workers were misguided by some external forces.
Meanwhile, Gujrat’s Chief Minister Narendra Modi is all set to welcome Suzuki in the state.
No comments:
Post a Comment