 "Car production comes to a halt at Toyota's Bidadi plants")
TKM declared a lockout at its plants on Sunday morning after talks over wage negotiation between the management and workers' union failed. Toyota manufactures about 700 cars a day at its Bidadi plants.
This is the second instance of a lockout in Toyota Kirloskar Motors in its 15-year history in India. In 2006, the firm had locked out the factory for delay in wage negotiations.
More From This Section
As a result of the go-slow strike by workers, the company has lost a production of 2,000 vehicles in the last 25 days, said Shekar Viswanathan, vice- chairman, TKM.
For the past 10 months, the management and the union have been discussing the charter of demands for FY14. As bipartite agreement was not reached, the labour department of the Karnataka government conducted seven tripartite meetings to reach a settlement. The conciliation efforts of the labour department have not yet resulted in an agreement, the company said in a statement.
Meanwhile, tripartite talks held on Monday between the management of TKM, Toyota Kirloskar Motors Employees Union and the labour department broke down as both the parties stuck to their demands.
Unlike most companies that revise salaries once in three years, TKM revises wages every year with effect from April. For FY14, the company is yet to arrive at a mutually-agreeable wage hike.
Employees are demanding an increase of Rs 8,000 an employee for the year, while the company management has offered Rs 3,050. Over the last 10 months, the workers and the management have not been able to arrive at a consensus.
"We have revised upwards our offer from Rs 2,400 a month to Rs 3,050. We cannot give more than this. The employees should understand that we are facing a difficult period due to slowdown in sales. We have been affected due to rupee depreciation as we import a significant portion of components and have run into losses," said Viswanathan.
Prasanna Kumar, president, Toyota Kirloskar Motors Employees Union, said: "The management has declared the lockout illegally without giving us a 14-day notice. Other than wage hike, the company is not ensuring healthy working conditions in the factory. There are some safety-related issues involved." For FY13, the firm had effected a wage hike of Rs 4,000 an employee. "The management has held up wage hike owing to adverse business conditions. The company's car sales have been on a downward curve throughout the year. The management is not ready to even maintain the previous year's increase in salary. The workers are not ready to accept the hike offered by the management as they feel the current price rise is much higher than the wage hike offered by the management," said a trade union activist.
There are 4,500 permanent workers and 400 contract workmen in TKM.
In order to exploit cheap labour, the management uses contract workers to do core manufacturing activity, the trade union activist pointed out. In a statement, the management said: "Under the instigation of the union, certain sections of the employees have resorted to deliberate stoppages of the production line, abuse and threatening of supervisors thereby continuously disrupting business for the past 25 years. All these unlawful activities have been detailed in the lockout notice. With this background, the company is left with no other option but to declare a lockout of the premises to ensure the safety of its workers and management personnel."
- TKM declared a lockout at its plants on Sunday morning after talks over wage negotiation between the management and workers' union failed
- This is the second instance of a lockout in Toyota Kirloskar Motors in its 15-year history in India. In 2006, the firm had locked out the factory for delay in wage negotiations
- For the past 10 months, the management and the union have been discussing the charter of demands for FY14