ON a RAINBOW in the SKY... the Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
morcha ON A RAINBOW IN THE SKY... the chattisgarh mukti morcha Centre for Education and Communication, New Delhi Cover and Illustration Avinash Deshpande Dossier compiled by Soupama Lahin Published September 1998 Centre for Education and Communication 173-A Khirki Village Malviya Nagar New Delhi-110 017 Teh 623 2755, 623 2758, 628 6841 Fax: 628 6842 E-mail: [email protected] Contents Foreword 5 September 28,1991 7 The Unfolding of Violence 9 The Deathless Patriot 12 The Man was a Machine with a Human Heart 18 A New Kind of Awakening 23 Trade Union as Peoples’ Movement 27 Trade Union for Social Change 29 Trade Unionism with a Difference 39 Tribal Miners: The Search for Salvation 43 Klines’ Mechanisation and People 48 The Matchbox Tipper 58 Pathbreaking Union’s Health Programme 68 Women Fight Back in the Mazdoor BaStis 71 Into the Labyrinth of Bhilai 75 Feeding the Crisis 77 Aftermath of Niyogi’s Murder 82 A V ear after Niyog? s Murder V2 Why Did I Decide to Go on Fast-Unto-Death? 95 BjP Govt’s Criminal Move to Suppress the Workers 99 In the Eye of the Storm 105 Trouble in Chattisgarh 113 Waiting for a Reprieve 118 Movements Beyond Chattisgarh 121 Voices of Dissent 123 Chattisgarh Andolan Samarthan Morcha (Delhi) 125 Solidarity Dhama at Boat Club 127 Marchers Demand Patwa Ouster 128 MP Govt. Dismissal Sought; Bhilai Firing Condemned 129 Parties, Unions Protest Poiice Firing in BViiiai TUs to Observe July 8 as ^Protest Day’ 131 Resignation Sought of Patwa Govt. 132 Furore in RS over Bhilai Killings 133 Din over Bhilai Killings in Lok Sabha 134 Advani Defends Madhya Pradesh Government 136 Remembering Shankar Guha Niyogi 137 Findings of the Peoples’ Tribunal on Bhilai Firing 138 Elusive Justice 145 Court Chronicle of a Murder Foretold 147 Thus Spoke The Hon’ble High Court 149 Excerpts from Trial Court Judgement 152 Niyogi Activists Take Battle to UP 159 Whereto... 161 Hang Together or Hang Separately 163 What Chattisgarh Movement Means 167 With Firm Moorings 171 Chattisgarh and National Question 174 Chattisgarh People’s Movement after Niyogi 177 Niyogi’s Murder and Trade Union Movement Today 180 After Niyogi 189 A Continuing Struggle 194 On A Rainbow in the Sky 198 Annexure 203 Foreword On September 28 falls the martyrdom day of Shankar Guha Niyogi, the compelling believer in human creativity and an organiser, who re-defined in practical terms, the contours of trade union movement in India. It is to this great visionary and to the Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha, the trade union movement and the political manifestation of the creativity of the community, that we submit this rarest collection of articles written on the person and the movement, from varied sources, spread over many years. Niyogi negated negations and synthesized institutions and structures with peoples’ participation. He rejected the affluence , the high technology and casteist elitism of the Bhilai Steel plant and opted for impoverishment, archaic technology and tribal identity of Dalli-Rajhara mines. He negated the concept of development and industrialisation as . a process of deprivation, de-skilling and displacement of masses; and upheld the view that meaningful industrialisation is that which taps the creativity of the people, and when the technology gets integrated into the day to day life and culture of the people. He was grieved by the disinterest of organised trade unions in addressing the problems of the contract workers in the captive mines of the Bhilai Steel plant, and engaged in a collaborative exercise with the miners, in building a qualitatively different trade union movement. Niyogi and his colleagues realised that in India, trade union movement of the subalterns should address the total life of the workers - schooling of children, technical education of workers, health, gender justice, rape, alcoholism etc., therefore, become the subject matter of the trade union. The trade union so built up, also challenged its own class limitations by forging a powerful alliance with the peasants in the countryside to build the Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha, a political peoples’ movement with a wholistic perspective. In building up this decentralised movement, he also overturned the conventional concept of ‘leader and the led’ by approaching each worker as a political leader. Such a creative, ingenious person was brutally murdered on September 28, 1991. Our Court of Law and the Law enforcing agencies could not establish who killed him. But Niyogi knew who were behind his murder; and he named industrialists in Bhilai, workers employed in whose establishments, he was organising. The Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha 5 It is ominous that the murder had happened in 1991, the year in which the Indian government had gone in for an intensive phase of liberalisation and restructuring of industries. It has shown that irrespective of what the so- called modem management says, workers are the perpetual enemies of industrialists and the objects of exploitation. Contrary to the expectation of the murderers, the Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha outlived the murder of Niyogi. The light can never be extinguished. The Centre for Education and Communication, a resource centre for labour, has been a close observer and keen learner of the alternative trade union movement in Dalli-Rajhara and Bhilai. We feel privileged to continue to be associated. The decision to bring out this volume, from the rich database of CEC’s documentation centre, was taken on a suggestion from the Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha Solidarity Group, Delhi. Mr. Soupama Lahiri has done a splendid job in going through the materials and putting the most relevant ones together in the present form. We acknowledge with thanks the support and contributions from Mr. K. G. Mukherjee, Mr. B. B. J. Tilak, Ms. Sudha Bhardwaj, Mr. Anand Swaroop Verma and Mr. Bharat Dogra in the collection and collation of information. Acknowledgements are also due to Mr. P. I. Raveendranathan, Ms. Anitha Prakash, Ms. Davinder Kaur and Mr. Rajeev Chaudhury of CEC in their contribution in preparing the document. We would like to clarify here that sources of all the articles are clearly mentioned and the copyright belongs to them as originally defined. New Delhi J. John September 24, 1998 6 On A Rainbow in the Sky September 28, 1991 The Unfolding of Violence Date Description Factory/Place 6.5.90 Daras Ram Sahu, activist of the Indian Bhilai People’s Front and a candidate for the Assembly elections murdered. 1.6.90 Rarnesh Pereira, an activist of the Trade Abhanpur, Unions Centre of India killed in police Raipur firing during a demonstration of workers protesting arrest of their leaders. 17.9.90 Two workers forcibly taken into the Bhilai premises of the Simplex Engineering Unit I and assaulted to prevent them from attending the first rally organised by Pragatisheel Engineering Shramik Sangh’s (PESS) in Bhilai. The FIR filed named Gvan Prakash Mishra (one of the prime accused in Niyogi murder case) as assailant. 6.11.90 15 workers of R. K. industries assaulted by Bhilai 20-25 heavily armed goons after being confined in factory premises on the pretext of overtime. FIR filed. 7.11.90 Ravindra Shukla, vice-president of Bhilai Chattisgarh Chemical Mills Mazdoor Sangh (CCMMS) and a union leader in Chattisgarh Distilleries, assaulted in Housing Colony. 12.11.90 Jagdish Verma, joint secretary, PESS and Bhilai union leader in Gyan Re-rolling Mills, assaulted at a tea shop in exactly the same manner as Shukla above. 25.11.90 Ram Vilas Mandal, General Secretary of Bhilai PESS and 11 others of Bhilai Wires Pvt. Ltd. wounded in attack by the so-called The Chattisgarh Mukti Morcha 9 ‘rival union’ members. 7.1.91 Mani Ram Verma, a striking worker of Bhilai Simplex Engineering & Foundry Works, was found dead in his house in suspicious circumstances. PESS claimed he was murdered. 26.1.91 Ten women workers of Kedia Distilleries Bhilai brutally lathicharged by police at the factory gate in the presence of company’s General Manager. 6.4.91 Alam Khan and Chandraiekha Bai Blniai sustained severe scalp injuries in a concerted attack by the police and the goons when workers were protesting at being denied entry in Kedia Distilleries. 16.4.91 About 200 workers of the first shift were Chattisgarh not allowed to enter the factory by the Distilleries, management. Workers reassembled before Kumhari the second shift and the management initially allowed diem to enter the factory premises. All of a sudden, a 100-strong police force under CSP Shn Sailesh Singh lathicharged the workers. Contractors and their goons joined the police. A large number of workers including women were thrashed up. Smt. Jugubai Pachdevari fell unconscious after being beaten up. Contractors’ goons later went around in a jeep to the neighbouring villages and beat up all those suspected to be CMM supporters. 25.6.91 Lathicharge on workers’ procession at Jamul, Bhilai Bhilai after TI Shri Salam drove his motor cycle into the procession and kicked a pregnant woman. Activists Chandrashila Bai, Bhim Rao Bagde, Anoop Singh were grievously injured. Union office was ransacked and files, typewriter, jeep, etc. illegally confiscated. Persons in the office including 65 women and patients waiting 10 On A Rainbow in the Sky for their weekly clinic beaten up and arrested. 27.6.91 Workers Srinivas, Munshilal, Shambhu Kedia Prasad and Hardev were brutally beaten Distilleries, up inside the Kedia Distilleries premises Bhilai by goondas hired by contractors. 19.8.91 Attempt on the life of Shri Uma Shankar Simplex Rai, office bearer of PESS and worker in Engineeering, Simplex Engineering., outside the gate of Bhilai Bharat Industrial Works by contractors of the Simplex Group in the presence of TI Salam.