The Hindu : Karnataka News : Beedi workers' meet fails to address real issues

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Nov 09, 2004

Karnataka

Karnataka

Beedi workers' meet fails to address real issues

By M. Raghuram

MANGALORE, NOV. 8. The three-day National Beedi Workers' Conference, which concluded here last week, lost a golden opportunity to tackle issues relating to the workers.

Though the meet secured nationwide attention the real issues were not addressed at all.

The Left parties took the right decision to organise the conference in Mangalore, which is well known as a key centre of the beedi industry in the country, but issues pertaining to labour as a whole in the country took precedence over those affecting beedi workers.

However, there was some consolation as the draft resolution that was adopted on the penultimate day spoke of the plight of the beedi workers.

Central theme

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) wanted the beedi workers' issues to be the central theme of the conference. Some 350 delegates from beedi industries, labour unions, observers, and workers from all over the country had converged here with a hope that the issues affecting the beedi industry, especially that of bringing the beedi workers in the organised sector, would be addressed.

The beedi workers were expecting that the conference would explore the "hegemony" exercised by contractors. Since the Beedi and Cigar Workers (Conditions of Employment) Act, 1966 classified the beedi workers as "home workers" they were largely at the mercy of contractors, who did not provide adequate raw material.

Those who could roll 1,000 beedis every day were given material that would produce only around 800 beedis. This also meant that the beedi workers did not get full work and were paid only around Rs. 45 a day when they should have got Rs. 56.50 for 1,000 beedies.

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