Take action against Tata - Thursday 5 August, 10.30am
IUF | 03.08.2010 13:09 | Gender | Workers' Movements
Show solidarity with locked out tea workers in West Bengal, exploited by Tata and victimised for demanding their rights
Tata action
10.30 on Thursday, August 5 at
Crowne Plaza London-St. James
Buckingham Gate
London
SW1E 6AF U.K.
*****
For nearly one year workers at the Nuwera Nuddy tea estate in West Bengal have been fighting for their very basic rights to be treated as human beings. Nowera Nuddy Tea Estate is owned by Amalgamated Plantations Private Limited, a company controlled by the owners of the Tetley Tea Brand, the Tata Group.
In August 2009, Arti Oraon, A TEA WORKER AND 8 months pregNANT, collapsed in the field and was brought to the hospital, on a platform towed by a tractor, after the COMPANY medical officer refused to make an ambulance available.
As news of her treatment spread, some 500 mostly female estate workers gathered in protest at the medical facility, demanding sanctions against the medical officer. Workers' dissatisfaction was fuelled by systematic abuse of workers' rights on the plantation, including long-standing problems over the denial of paid maternity and sick leave and inadequate housing.
Local management promised to meet with the workers, but on August 11 the management, along with the medical officer, left the estate and declared a lockout, which lasted two weeks. Tata imposed a second lockout when workers refused to accept the suspension of 8 workers identified by management as 'leaders' of the mass protest. The second lockout lasted from September 14 until December 12, during which time the workers received no wages or rations from the company.
There have been no negotiations, no compensation, the workers targeted for suspension remain suspended.
Incredibly in late April 2010 police visited the plantation to announce that arrest warrants had been issued for Arti Oraon and 11 other worker activists, including the 8 already suspended workers, on charges, including theft, grievous bodily harm, unlawful assembly, criminal intimidation and unlawful confinement. These charges can carry prison terms of seven years and more.
You can fund further information about the case here.
http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/133
http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/397
And about Tata's' refusal to let a trade union delegation investigate the deaths of 3 workers in an estate in Assam.
http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/455
IUF has written to Tetley UK to ask them to intervene in the case but to no avail. We have also made direct approached to the Tata company to meet with IUF but have received no response.
IUF is therefore looking for ways to get Tata to talk! So we organsing a small action at Tata's Taj hotel in London were we will distribute information about Nuwera Nuddy and also a new report by War on Want, Bitter Tea, looking at working conditions on tea plantations in India and Kenya - both major suppliers to the UK tea market.
The action is planned for
10.30 on Thursday, August 5 at
Crowne Plaza London-St. James
Buckingham Gate
London
SW1E 6AF U.K.
10.30 on Thursday, August 5 at
Crowne Plaza London-St. James
Buckingham Gate
London
SW1E 6AF U.K.
*****
For nearly one year workers at the Nuwera Nuddy tea estate in West Bengal have been fighting for their very basic rights to be treated as human beings. Nowera Nuddy Tea Estate is owned by Amalgamated Plantations Private Limited, a company controlled by the owners of the Tetley Tea Brand, the Tata Group.
In August 2009, Arti Oraon, A TEA WORKER AND 8 months pregNANT, collapsed in the field and was brought to the hospital, on a platform towed by a tractor, after the COMPANY medical officer refused to make an ambulance available.
As news of her treatment spread, some 500 mostly female estate workers gathered in protest at the medical facility, demanding sanctions against the medical officer. Workers' dissatisfaction was fuelled by systematic abuse of workers' rights on the plantation, including long-standing problems over the denial of paid maternity and sick leave and inadequate housing.
Local management promised to meet with the workers, but on August 11 the management, along with the medical officer, left the estate and declared a lockout, which lasted two weeks. Tata imposed a second lockout when workers refused to accept the suspension of 8 workers identified by management as 'leaders' of the mass protest. The second lockout lasted from September 14 until December 12, during which time the workers received no wages or rations from the company.
There have been no negotiations, no compensation, the workers targeted for suspension remain suspended.
Incredibly in late April 2010 police visited the plantation to announce that arrest warrants had been issued for Arti Oraon and 11 other worker activists, including the 8 already suspended workers, on charges, including theft, grievous bodily harm, unlawful assembly, criminal intimidation and unlawful confinement. These charges can carry prison terms of seven years and more.
You can fund further information about the case here.
http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/133 http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/397 And about Tata's' refusal to let a trade union delegation investigate the deaths of 3 workers in an estate in Assam.
http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/455 IUF has written to Tetley UK to ask them to intervene in the case but to no avail. We have also made direct approached to the Tata company to meet with IUF but have received no response.
IUF is therefore looking for ways to get Tata to talk! So we organsing a small action at Tata's Taj hotel in London were we will distribute information about Nuwera Nuddy and also a new report by War on Want, Bitter Tea, looking at working conditions on tea plantations in India and Kenya - both major suppliers to the UK tea market.
The action is planned for
10.30 on Thursday, August 5 at
Crowne Plaza London-St. James
Buckingham Gate
London
SW1E 6AF U.K.
IUF
