Chapter-4

POLITICAL / SYMPATHETIC STRIKES AND DISPUTES DUE TO REASONS OTHER THAN INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES

4.1 Analysis of Political and Sympathetic Strikes: Month-wise and Sphere-wise data on Political and Sympathetic Strikes during the year 2007 have been presented in Table 4(I). It reveals that the these strikes accounted for a time-loss of 65,913 Mondays in the Central Sphere and 8,877 mandays in the State Sphere. In all there were twenty such strikes during the year in both the spheres ( Table 4(II) ). The maximum time-loss (41,859 mandays) due to these strikes was in the Central Sphere in Andhra Pradesh, which accounted for 63.51 per cent of the total time-loss in the Central Sphere. In the State Sphere, Kerala State had recorded the time-loss (72.77 per cent) of the total time-loss in State Sphere. The Central Sphere had accounted for the maximum time loss of 88.13 per cent and State Sphere had accounted for 11.87 per cent only to the total time-loss of both sphere during the year 2007.

4.2 Analysis of Disputes due to reasons other than Industrial Disputes: Tables 4(III) and 4(IV) present State-wise, Cause-wise and Industry-wise statistics of disputes due to reasons other than Industrial Disputes during the Year 2007.

4.2.1 It may by seen from these tables that the ‘Financial Stringency’ was responsible for maximum number of disputes (i.e., 136) resulting in a time-loss of 6.87 million mandays which accounted for 90.42 per cent of the total time-loss during the year. The State of West Bengal had the maximum number of disputes (131) affecting 21,988 workers and resulting in a time-loss of 5.99 million mandays. In the State Sphere, Private sector alone was entirely responsible for the time-loss during the year, as there was no time-loss in Public Sector in both State and Central Spheres ( Tables 4(III) ).

4.2.2 Industry-wise details of such disputes are given in Table 4(IV). The Industry group ‘Manufacture of Textiles’ (Industry Code 17) in the State Sphere was responsible for the maximum number of mandays lost in 2007 (2.76 million mandays) which was 36.28 per cent of the total time-loss due to strikes and lockouts. Second in the order was the industry group ‘Manufacturing of Basic Metals (Industry Code 27) which was responsible for a time-loss of 1.14 million mandays or 14.99 per cent of the total time-loss.

4.2.3 Out of the total 163 disputes, there were 161 cases of Lockouts (98.77 per cent) and 2 cases of Strikes (1.23 per cent). Lockouts accounted for 99.81 per cent of the time-loss, while 0.19 per cent of the time-loss was due to strikes