Workers Against UNILEVER - The Biggest TNC In India, Hindustan Lever Ltd. [Garden Reach (cal) Works]
It was unusual, and perhaps unthinkable too, say, 30 or 40 years back, to find such an editorial article with the above mentioned heading(s) in the theoretical journal of a communist organisation of India, or any other country. And why not, continuity of trade union struggle and its organisation in a factory (or in thousands of factories) was (were) thought as a necessity for the communists, but it was (were) then commonplace, and not worthy to be celebrated in any editorial piece in their theoretical journal, and that too for completing '17' years . But we are passing through a very 'unusual' time these days. It is not just 'now', or 'for 10 years or so'. Even to say - "since the inception of the New Economic Policy" would not suffice and would not be correct. Rather, it would be correct to say that we are passing through a very long period of lull, a very long period of low ebb of workers' struggle, and a period of defeat of the International Working Class Movement, of the International Communist Movement. . This has made things very hard for the workers, and also the communist activists, to preserve the continuity of even a TU struggle and organisation in a factory for a long duration of almost two decades, and to move forward. It doesn't matter whether that factory is situated in Detroit or Durban or Calcutta or Buenos Aires. And it becomes all the more difficult when the struggle is against the largest TNC working in India , which, naturally, gets all the blessings of the New World Order / Economic Policy of the Governments — both of the union and states. Obviously, by 'TU struggle and organisation ' we mean real struggle, not some fa?ade-of-a-struggle, or pseudo -struggle, and a real TU organisation, which can and does function as a ' school of communism' and not as ' just another TU', specimens of the latter being abundantly available in India. For someone not much acquainted with the Factory-Scenario of India the above statement needs some explanation. Briefly it can be said that —" non-real-struggles " occur often in India, which are created from above and end up in some got-up 'victories' and the TU organisations are 'organisations of the leaders', with workers have little or no control over their TU — even most of them don't have the faintest idea that the TU belongs to the workers themselves, and the workers must and can run them , etc. The TU leaders - Party leaders - Industrialists / Management/ Govt. administration / police, etc nexus is very much overt, and this TRIO is bent on maintaining "Industrial Peace" at any cost. Thus it become very difficult for the workers to think and do in a new way , depending on themselves, and not on any force external to them and against all odds. Communist activists working sincerely among the workers to help workers develop their struggle, and to help them to develop themselves as class-conscious, really communist vanguards, can understand the acute and tough constraint of the present time; and it is a prerogative for them to discuss mutually the salient points of their experiences among themselves.
It goes to the credit of the workers of the HLL [Garden Reach, Calcutta Unit], the worker-leaders and the only few communist-activists (in most of the time only one in number) that facing all the hard constraints and the thorny tests of the time they didn't allow their union to loose the characteristic of a ' TU of a new type' representing what was described as ' real struggle and a real TU organisation'; rather they are upholding the fighting banner for long seventeen years — standing almost alone, as if like an isolated turbulent island amidst a sea of enforced peace, enforced among the workers in WB for a long time. The ice of peace that started to melt down very slowly since, say, '94. Approximately, from that time started some movements among the workers in some places towards forming new struggles and organisation, reflected in a somewhat marked way in the Jute Industry. . But these struggles are still not assumed such strength so as to lend the HLL [Garden Reach - Calcutta] workers effective support other than some shows of 'moral' support and solidarity, which are, nonetheless, valuable, and able at least to put a little bit of pressure on the business-friendly govt. Of course, the TU organisations of other HLL units in other states deserve to be thanked for the same. But, generally speaking, the situation is not markedly, or, drastically changed from that of 1991 when the HLL / Garden Reach - Calcutta workers are fighting against the strong TRIO force — the nexus of [1] - the TNC / foreign imperialist capital planning always to suck super-profit by putting enormous work load on the workers by down-sizing, curtailing existing earned 'facilities', etc; [2] - the Party - TU zealous to keep 'industrial peace' even by 'un-peaceful' methods, and, [3] - the government machineries of both the Union and State, while the working class, at large, still not ready to come forward to the aid of their class brethren fighting in the advanced post, still doubtful about the final outcome of the HLL fight, and the future of their would-be fights if they do the same. The long 17 years of protracted fight of the HLL - Garden Reach - Calcutta workers and their ability to preserve their unity and organisation, and also their capability to defend their posts and advance a little bit - all these contributed their due towards solving that impasse. Though , however, it is needless to say that it is impossible for the fighting workers of one or a handful of factories to break down the unbearable Catch-22 situation through which the working-class is passing. Every whip of the Capital, now emboldened and strengthened by the twin-syndrome of the defeat of the International Working Class Movement and the rise of the New Economic Regime worldwide, is pushing the working class to rise. A 'slow-eruption' of fights, a slow 'hot-up' is also visible in several places across the globe. But nobody can predict exactly when the ' spontaneity ' of working-class struggle will re-emerge, and it is foolish to think that it can be 'created' from above by some suitable tactic — a frustration-led thought - which is not very rare these days .
But exactly what are the credit points earned by the HLL - Garden Reach - Calcutta workers and their organisation? And what are their limitations? It is already mentioned that they could preserve the character of theirTU as a 'new type of TU' withstanding all pressures arising from the present situation . And, when the workers are, in general, in the 'receiving end' of the blows of Capital, the HLL - Garden Reach - Calcutta workers could not only withstand the attacks of the TRIO combine , but also snatched some 'un-expect-able' or 'unthinkable' 'victories'. Let us zoom in on these. The most recent example was that the workers, under the leadership of their TU, successfully snatched a victory in thwarting the management's move to impose a forced " Voluntary Retirement Scheme " which would have affected more than 500 workers i.e. nearly 40% of the present strength of the work-force. And they did that on the face of the management's declaration of strike, i.e. lock-out, which went on for more than long 6 months and the government's go-slow in mitigating the 'dispute' — otherwise such a long lock-out in such an important TNC factory, which never faced lock-out in the past, can't be explained. Isn't that a 'well-nigh impossible' feat, when the normal-scenario is the smooth-run of VRS? Wherefrom they got that strength? They got that strength, training and valour from their past struggles. For example in the first half of the '90s they were successful in converting more than 150 contract-workers members of the ' permanent ' work force, and compelling the management to recognise their fighting union through a fight which lasted for a very long period, almost, 7 years!! It is not possible to describe in dry words the unbearable hardships faced by the workers and their TU during that struggle which was their inaugural big fight, to re-produce in this black-and-white page the blood and sweat of the workers, their pain and agony, and their un-daunted-ness in the fight. What generally / mostly happens now a days to the fighting workers and their organisation in the face of such 'un-surmountable' resistance from the TRIO opposition, can be termed as a 'swing towards right-ism', deviations expressed by - tilt towards finding a heavy-weight TU leader and submitting to the power of his/her 'legal' tactics, manoeuvring arts, 'contacts' etc and giving-up or not-starting-at-all their fight relying mainly on their own. In many cases we also saw such extreme opposite pictures as inviting reactionary-right leaders/ ministers, etc, and discarding the red banner with the plea of "the workers' opposition to red" / "keeping the door open for all who can help" and relying on the "strength" / "aid" of 'benevolent' intellectuals (bourgeois / petty-bourgeois); etc, etc. On the contrary, although the workers of HLL - Garden Reach - Calcutta did go to the courts, as a step coming up in their pitched battle against the opposition forces, but they never pin all their hopes on the court-battle and wound-up or slackened their fighting spirit, neither did they loose faith on their fighting organisation - thanks to the worker-leaders and the activist(s) there. And, what is interesting, and important too is that through a persistent effort during all those stormy days, a layer, a batch of worker-leaders has been created who have learnt the 'art' or 'skill' of handling themselves the regular affairs of the union and thus the worker -leaders are now able to run their own TU , a picture not plentifully found in our country. And these worker -leaders are now also capable to move outside their own factory as agitators / activists.
But, nonetheless, there remains a strong impediment, a historical limitation, and that is 'un-surmountable' by the workers of a single factory, in this case the workers of HLL - Garden Reach - Calcutta a limitation inherent in the present situation. The limitation is that they are not surrounded by waves of rising/turbulent struggles of the workers and toilers all over the society, by an environment which help to incubate 'revolutionary ideas', help to develop advanced class-conscious workers, etc Rather the opposite, sadly, is true. And so remain the challenges in front of the advanced worker-leaders and activists which are — [1] not to deviate/ get derailed from the working-class-line, despite the fact that it is almost same tricky-and-tough now a days as walking on a razor's edge or tight rope; in other words not to loose their strength in holding high the red flag; and, [2] despite the obstacles placed by the surrounding, to carry on an almost impossible task, the task of developing class-conscious workers by fighting the alien, non-class ideas - which like viruses attack from a surrounding favourable to them. For the first task, they will have to explain the whole situation and the necessity of fulfilling this task to the workers down to the grass roots, and will have to develop the fight against non-class trends as and when they arise. The last mentioned task is the task of the communist activists, worker and non-worker alike, and this is to be accomplished, under the constraints now placed by the history, mainly by continuous political-ideological education within, 'ideological-political' fights within, and also by the continuity of their TU fights as and when they rise, and continuous participation in political agitation-propaganda activities. How much they succeed in these only future can tell, and to help them in these efforts is an urgent and necessary/compulsory task of the revolutionary-communist organisations.
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