Paris, Thursday, September 7, 2000 Indian Telecom Workers Strike, Seeking Job-Security Assurance
Compiled by Our Staff From Dispatches
NEW DELHI - More than 300,000 employees of India's state-run telecommunications department began an indefinite strike Wednesday to bolster demands for job security when the agency is turned into a corporation in October. Union officials said the impact of the strike by the three main unions at the Department of Telecom Services would take about two days to show up because networks are largely automated. But maintenance services were expected to be hit early.
The strike began at 6:00 a.m., covering most of the country, but services in New Delhi and Bombay, the financial capital, were not expected to be affected since they are run by a separate state-controlled company, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd.
K. Vallinayagam, secretary-general of the Federation of National Telecom Organizations, said the workers, who include technicians and junior administration staff, were not satisfied by government assurances Tuesday. ''How can we go by assurances?'' he said. ''For the past one year we have been calling off strikes on assurances. Assurance has a meaning when there is a time limit.''
The federation is one of the three unions which control 90 percent of the 325,000 workers in these categories.
''We are thankful the minister took pains to settle some of the issues but important issues remain,'' said the secretary general of the federation, Om P. Gupta.
The department, which will be turned into a government-owned company on Oct. 1, has more than 400,000 employees.
The communications minister, Ram Vilas Paswan, said after talks with the unions Tuesday that workers were assured of job security, a flexible pension plan and the financial viability of the new company. But 11th-hour negotiations failed despite a fresh appeal to call off the protest.
The strike came as the government said it would end state-run Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd.'s monopoly on overseas long-distance telephone calls from April 1, 2002, earlier than its original 2004 deadline.
The country's cabinet committee on economic affairs decided at its meeting Wednesday to end the company's monopoly two years ahead of schedule, Mr. Paswan said.