That’s the reason we determined to type a union – the Samsung India Staff Union – and utilized for its registration on July 25.
There have been almost 1,500 employees supporting our demand for the union – or greater than 75 per cent of these at our unit.
Regardless of assembly all industrial guidelines, our union has not been formally registered. Samsung can be refusing to recognise it, which is a violation of our rights as employees.
We now have many issues.
We regularly work past our nine-hour shifts, with none additional time pay. We should not have a option to refuse. Most employees must journey lengthy hours simply to succeed in the unit.
Despite the fact that we’re allowed almost 30 days of go away in a yr, our managers hardly ever approve them.
When a few of us are late or elevate considerations, we’re remoted and made to sit down in empty rooms till our supervisors allow us to again in to work. Typically we’re made to face in isolation for hours.
A much bigger concern is that there isn’t any transparency in wages. I’ve labored right here for greater than ten years, is it honest that I’m not even conscious of the principles for a pay hike?
The character of our work requires us to face all day, besides once we get to take brief 5 to ten-minute breaks. This typically causes well being points corresponding to painful varicose veins. We would like extra breaks.
My colleagues have made a number of calls for for higher working circumstances through the years – from mounted eight-hour shifts to having fun with time without work with out fears of shedding our jobs.
However such calls for prompted Samsung to take away a few of them and warn others into silence. In a single occasion, eight individuals have been fired with out discover.
Whereas inside committees are fashioned to deal with grievances, the reality is that they don’t have any actual energy.
Reasonably they segregated us into grades to quell dissent over wages, with pay lowering with every grade. We have been by no means given an evidence on why and on what foundation the segregation exists regardless of repeated requests.
All of those considerations snowballed and introduced us to a typical determination to organise ourselves as a union.
The ‘no work, no pay’ situation has put us in a tough place as many people are sole breadwinners and must pay month-to-month mortgage installments. A few of my colleagues might have given in due to this harsh actuality.
Some Samsung officers had visited a few of the employees at their houses, providing them perks and urging them to return to work. However why not simply take heed to what we wish as an alternative?
It doesn’t matter what Samsung does or says. We don’t intend to surrender till our union is recognised.”
This story was printed with permission from Thomson Reuters Basis, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian information, local weather change, resilience, ladies’s rights, trafficking and property rights. Go to https://www.context.information/.
