COVID-19, DIDN'T BREAK THE SYSTEM, BUT EXPOSED A BROKEN SYSTEM

Chandigarh : (Bearue) : "The condition of the working class in our country has become unbearable. Unemployment, exploitation and poverty have reached levels never seen before.
In one sector after another, lakhs of contract workers, daily-wage workers and even those on regular payroll have been thrown out of their jobs, without any severance pay. Many of those who remain employed have not been paid wages for several months.
According to AA Azeez, Crores of workers have been forced to flee to their villages and home towns as a result of the lockdown. Those who return to the cities are being made to work under dangerous conditions, without adequate protection against the corona virus.

Mr. Ashok Ghose said Employers’ contributions to the Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) have been cut, as also the interest rate earned on this retirement fund. Now from media source we apprehend that Union Govt. is thinking to reduce epf interest rate from 8.5 to to 8.1 percent. Workers’ savings are being handed over to capitalist speculators. Public sector companies are being burdened with huge losses and unaffordable debt, as part of creating the conditions for handing them over to private capitalist companies.
Union Government  has already started a process of Private Mining and distributions of coal blocks to corporate.
We are proud to say that coal workers unitedly went on 3 days successful strike throughout the Country from 2-4 july to protest against private mining.

Mr. Azeez mentioned that, Announcing a so-called economic revival package, the Prime Minister gave the call to turn the present crisis into an opportunity. This is a call to the capitalist class to use this as an opportunity to intensify the exploitation of labour to the maximum degree possible. It is a call to deprive workers of their rights, extend their working hours and cut down their wages and benefits. It is a call to all the central ministries to accelerate the process of outsourcing and privatisation. It is a call to all state governments to reform labour laws so as to deprive workers of minimum wages, 8-hour limit on the working day and other hard won rights.
In spite of the lockdown, workers are out on the streets in protest. They are protesting against their miserable conditions and demanding their rights. Doctors, nurses and other health sector workers who are in the frontlines of the struggle against Corona virus are protesting against the lack of adequate protective equipment. Workers in banking, telecom, railways, coal mining and other sectors are fighting resolutely against privatisation and the wrecking of public assets.
In this connection, we would like to mention here that UTUC.and other Central TUs have written so many letter to Union Government asking them to restrain from anti people Socio-economic policies, but invein.

Crores of workers participated in the countrywide protest on 3rd July in response to the joint call by ten central trade unions and federations. They raised the longstanding demands of the working class, including an end to the contract labour system, equal pay for equal work, a minimum wage of Rs 18000/- per month ( as on 2016), recognition of health sector “volunteers” (ICDS, Asha and others) as workers, halt and reversal of anti-worker amendments to the labour laws, universal pension scheme covering all working people, registration of trade unions within 45 days of application, immediate halt to the privatization program and a universal Public Distribution System.
The times are calling on all sections of workers to show our strength and assert our rights, as workers and as human beings. Our strength lies in our unity, our organisation and our consciousness. In order to build our strength, we need to raise our level of organisation and consciousness. We need to overcome the factors that divide us and divert us from our real enemy.
We workers belong to one class, with one common interest. We have to act as one, irrespective of which federation our union belongs to and to which party that federation is affiliated. We must build and strengthen workers’ unity committees in industrial areas and service sector hubs. Activists of different unions need to come together in such committees in defence of workers’ rights.

Since 2004 in our Country Government have changed but the government’s program did not change. Successive governments have stuck to the program of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation, aimed at enriching the most powerful capitalists at the expense of the toiling people. What does this show? It shows that behind these parties stands the capitalist class, headed by the Tatas, Ambanis, Adanes, Birlas and other monopoly houses. It is they who wield political power.
The entire political system and its electoral process are designed to maintain the rule of the capitalist class.
 Elections are used by the capitalist class to install one or the other of their tried and trusted parties in charge of the state machinery.

Parties of the ruling class and the corporate controlled news media constantly carry out communal propaganda blaming people of this or that religion as our main enemy.

 They want to hide the truth that our main enemy is the Indian capitalist class in power, headed by the monopoly houses, and their imperialist allies headed by the USA. They want to hide the fact that the capitalist system and the State which defends this system is the main source of our problems.
We workers must rise above all differences of religion, caste, union and party affiliation, and strengthen our fighting unity against our common enemy – the Indian and international capitalist class.

 A new political system is needed for ensuring the fulfilment of our just demands and for guaranteeing the protection of all the rights that belong to us.
We must fight for a State and Constitution which guarantee that we who toil get to enjoy the fruits of our toil.
So Comrades, let us organise and unite working class and left-democratic people, and strike together