Day after staff kill CEO, Labour Minister tells India Inc: You have been warned

Manoj C G & Alka Pande

New Delhi | Lucknow, September 23The day the family cremated Lalit Kumar Choudhary, the CEO of the Greater Noida-based firm who was lynched by workers yesterday, while industry groups reacted with a chorus of outrage, Union Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes said his murder should serve as a “warning” to corporates.

Blaming what he called hire-and-fire policies of companies for “simmering discontent” among workers, Fernandes asked “managements to deal with them with compassion”.

“People are employed on contract basis. There is disparity in wages of permanent workers and contract workers. There is simmering discontent among workers and they should not be driven to such an extent as happened in Greater Noida...Managements have to see this as a warning and they should also respond adequately,” Fernandes said.

He said that companies tend to hire people on contracts even when they are in a position to make permanent appointments, leading to fewer jobs in the organised sector. “Workers react violently when they lose their jobs,” the Minister said, adding, “At the same time, managements have their problems also. But what I am saying is that the whole issue should be viewed with compassion. I appeal to companies to treat workers’ problems with compassion.”

Fernandes has called for a review of the industrial disputes resolution system, so that emphasis is put on bipartite consultations, building of trust through information sharing, and the promotion of voluntary arbitration over adjudication.

Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority (GNIDA) CEO Pankaj Agarwal said the death of Graziano Transmissioni CEO Choudhary was “not merely a law and order problem”. And that the incident “is concerned with the whole industrial environment of the state. We are seriously looking into why this kind of situation cropped up, besides reviewing policies to ensure that such incidents are not repeated.” He added that it was “unfortunate that an international company CEO had to sacrifice his life to awaken the Government to introspect (on) the industrial situation”.

The web site of the GNIDA says there is “round-the-clock patrolling by mobile police vans for law and order maintenance” in Greater Noida. Yet, Graziano has said police took hours to arrive on the scene, and Choudhary might have been saved if only they had reached sooner.

While the company spokesperson said that in January, the workers had registered with AITUC, the CPI’s trade union wing, general secretary CPI’s Gurudas Dasgupta told The Indian Express that there was no such affiliation.

Outraged industry organizations said the lynching damages India’s image among global investors. “It is definitely a deterrent to industrial growth. The atmosphere should be safe and sound for industry,” Amitabh Nangia, Chairman, CII Western U P zonal council, said. Diljeet Titus, chairman of the Northern region committee of the Indo-Italian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said, “Labour unrest takes place everywhere but it is unfortunate that in this particular incident, things went out of hand.”

The Indo-American Chamber of Commerce said the incident set a bad precedent for Uttar Pradesh, which needs investment and job opportunities. Assocham president Sajjan Jindal said, “The UP administration needs to take stringent action against those who have committed the gruesome act to restore confidence of investors in the state. Late on Tuesday evening, Chief Minister Mayawati announced an inquiry into the incident by the DIG, Meerut range. She said the incident was “unfortunate”, and her government was committed to the security of industry and entrepreneurs.

The Italian embassy expressed concern and hoped that the judicial system would prosecute the perpetrators. “The situation had been repeatedly brought to the attention of the competent Indian authorities both at Central and local level,” the Italian Embassy said in a statement today. “The incident is all the more worrying as Graziano Transmissioni, after many successful years, had been facing several months of violent forms of protests by self-proclaimed workers representatives”, it said.

Italy warned, no one heard

The Italian ambassador wrote to the UP government two months ago, seeking enhanced security at the factory until the labour dispute had been resolved. If the agitators harmed company staff, Italy might pull out all investment from U P, he warned. “The matter was discussed even by the U P Chief Secretary,” L K Gupta, spokesperson for the company, said. SP (Rural) Babu Ram confirmed the local police had received communication of the envoy’s concerns. “We sent a report on the law and order situation to Lucknow,” he said.