How the legal battle united Maruti workers
only 28. I took his place.”
Niwas and his colleagues also built alliances with other worker struggles like at Suzuki-subsidiary Bellsonica that operates from the same campus.
“In Bellsonica, the ‘Maruti effect’ made management wary of worker violence and amenable to compromise,” said the Bellsonica worker, “From 2014 to 2017, we managed to raise the number of permanent workers in our factory from 89 to 705.”
Rather than going on strike, the workers subtly raised pressure on the management.
“One day all workers brought a fistful of channa to work,” the source said, “The next day they brought bed-sheets, the third day it was something else.” Each object was a sign to management that workers were prepared to occupy the plant to fulfil their demands. “But we never struck — a threat only works if you don’t carry it through.”
In Maruti’s own Manesar plant, 2012 has left a mixed legacy. The fracas had first begun over the intensity of work: The factory rolled out a new car every 50 seconds, management wanted to increase production to one car per 48 seconds.
“Today, we work on a 59 second deadline,” said Pawan Kumar, who still works at Maruti; even as he conceded that the company now employed over 10,000 temporary workers, compared to about 6,500 when he was union president in 2013-14.
“But the biggest legacy of 2012 is that forged an understanding between permanent and temporary workers,” Kumar said, “This unity will be hard to break.”