From: tstpcc@gwunix1.gwu.edu (Paul C. Chemmanoor)
Newsgroups: alt.culture.kerala
Subject: Unions & Industries in Kerala.
Date: 14 Dec 1992 18:59:10 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu


1] WHile agreeing with pratapan about the success that the 
   labour movement has had in raising the wages paid I agree
   with shankar unni that the unions are the primary reason why 
   industrialisation has failed in kerala.

   
2] The success of teh comunist party in penetrating the grass roots 
   level polity to build a suport base has meant a one-sided 
   approach to the issue of capital-formation and surplus-value.

   Simply put, communist ideology ignores the importance of 
   capital formation and the people who act as catalysts for that
   formation. On the other hand it emphasises the creation of 
   value as deriving solely from the efforts of the workers.
   
   This is simply not true but is a very useful tool to get votes.
   The generation of wealth does not happen spontaneously.
   The initiative and risk involved in the setting up of industry must
   be rewarded. Modern industry is not at the level of industrial
   revolution period England where exploitation of labour was rampant
   and possesion of capital was suffecient to generate more.

   The labour unions of kerala seems to have taken it as a inalienable
   right to force people to support them.

   
3] Where else in the world can you see unions telling the 
   employer that he or she must hire so many workers at such and such a rate
   regardless of the wishes of the employer and as shankar pointed out 
   sometimes regardless whether the workers themselves do not see it to be
   in their interests to take a confrontationary attitude with the employer.
 

   I see this kind of bullying as a clear over-stepping of the rights
   that workers have to form unions.

   
4]  To make this point clearer: It is not possible for a person in
    guruvayoor to order a truckload of bricks or sand or whatever else
    without being ordered to hire a certain number of workers at a certain
    rate, without any regard to teh number of people actually required
    to do the job.

    Needless to say, refusal means harrassment from the party.

   
5] It is in the interests of the communist parties to keep the 
   workers believe they are indisposable, and that they need
   to be protected from the ruthless employer.
   The fact is, in modern kerala, it is teh employer who is teh 
   victim.

   

6] Some of you who have read sci in teh past might now that
   Mr. Ajai Bannerjee had been hired by the kerala government
   to study the interaction of labour and industry in Kerala.

   I will request him to tell us what his findings were.
   

Later,
Paul Chemmanoor.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------
.    ~ ~                                                                  .
.    o o         signito ergo sum.                                        .
.     |       i sign therefore i am.               paul chemmanoor        .
.     =                                            washington d.c.        .
---------------------------------------------------------------------------