The Tamil Nadu government today said it was studying labour laws in Maharashtra and West Bengal.
The move comes after recent labour problems faced at multinational companies’ facilities in the state. The state administration had ruled out any possibility to implement a law that emphasised compulsory unions in factories.
Speaking to Business Standard on the sidelines of Great Lakes Post-graduate Working Professional Programme in Management, Tamil Nadu Labour Minister T M Anbarasan said the state government was studying labour laws in Maharastra and West Bengal, especially their recognition of unions in factories.
“We want to understand their laws, since they have allowed factories to recognise their unions,” he said. He, however, ruled out any possibility of the state government emphasising that the factories must have a union.
The government’s decision comes at a time when a three-party forum has been formed to find a solution to the labour crisis at Hyundai’s manufacturing facility in Sriperumbudur, 40 km from Chennai. The Hyundai Motor Employees Union, backed by CITU, which claims a majority of the employees are backing the union, halted the company’s production four times at the factory in two years.
This not only caused financial losses to the company but also forced it to move its i20 production section to a separate facility in Turkey.