Left seeking call centre comrades to set up unions

The CPI(M)'s trade union wing, the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), is banking on old comrades and Left-sympathisers in the information technology sector to gain a foothold and unionise call centre employees.

It has identified a host of people with a "Left background" who are running call centres or are employees in infotech companies.

Left sources told Business Standard that most of them were willing to cooperate with the CITU.

For instance, a former employee of a CPI(M) paper in Kolkata, who was running a call centre, recently contacted the CITU leadership to extend "all possible help" to the trade union, said sources.

Another person running a call centre in Bangalore used to be a member of the Students Federation of India, the CPI(M)'s student wing. He is in touch with CITU leaders.

A relative of a Left leader, who is an employee of an infotech company in Delhi, updates CITU leaders about the developments in this sector. The son of a veteran Left leader who works as an accountant in an infotech company recently did a study for the CITU "showing how a call centre has to invest only Rs 2 crore for a Rs 10 crore project".

"We have found them (sympathisers) everywhere. Their associates in the companies are ready to provide all help," confided a Left leader. Since it is difficult to form a union at the unit level, the strategy is to form "omnibus unions" for infotech and enabled services employees in every city.

"We need just seven members to register a union. Our people running the BPOs will be of great help in getting such unions registered. The names of the other members will be kept a secret," he said.

The omnibus trade union will be on the lines of West Bengal IT Services Association formed recently. CITU sources said it was decided to form the first union in West Bengal because it was easier to get it registered in a Left-ruled state.

As for West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee's views against unionisation of infotech and enabled services employees, CITU leaders said the central committee of the CPI(M) had already clarified that there could be no ban on the right to strike, to form a union and the right to collective bargaining.

"He (Bhattacharjee) is in the government. We are in the field. He will do what he thinks fit for running the administration. We will do what we think fit to protect the rights of workers," asserted a CITU leader and CPI(M) Politburo member.

After forming omnibus trade unions for infotech/infotech enabled services employees in different cities like Hyderabad, Bangalore and Delhi, the CITU plans to exert pressure on the United Progressive Alliance government to bring a central law for the implementation of labour laws in this sector and, especially, a provision to make it mandatory to give employees an appointment letter.

In the next five years, the number of employees in this sector would increase from 700,000 to 2 million and no trade union could afford to ignore them, said CITU sources.