Coal workers plan strike on pension funds merger issue

The five trade unions at state-owned Coal India and Singareni Collieries Company (SCCL) have decided to go on a three-day strike, from June 19 to 21, protesting the proposed merger of the Coal Mines Provident Fund (CMPF) with Employees Provident Fund (EPF) and the delay in revising wages of about five lakh coal workers.

The trade unions have served notice to Coal India, SCCL and the coal secretary.

According to trade union leaders, the proposed merger of CMPF and EPF will reduce pension of workers by three times the existing one. According to D D Ramanandan, general secretary of Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M)-supported All India Coal Workers Federation, the minimum pension for a worker will be reduced to ~7,500 per month from the existing minimum pension of ~20,000 a month.

“The Centre is devising ways to curb the legitimate pay of the workers and control the outgo from its coffers by depriving the workers of their legal benefits,” he said.

Trade union sources said the decision to proceed with the strike was taken in the BJP-backed Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh’s office in Delhi after talks between the trade union representatives, Coal India and government representatives failed.

SQ Zama, secretary general of Congress-supported Indian National Mineworkers’ Federation, said while the 10th Joint Bipartite Committee for the Coal Industry (JBCCI), a body comprising trade unions, Coal India management and government representatives were deliberating and negotiating the revision of wage and pension benefits, the Centre, without informing any trade unions, constituted the committee to look into the merger.

“This is backstabbing by the government. They formed the committee on April 19 and no trade unions even had any clue. How can the government toy with the workers’ future even without consulting them” Zama said.