Toyota labour union softens wage stand, asks to lift lockout

The workers union attached to Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) has softened its stand over the wage hike demand and asked the company to immediately lift the lockout at its Bidadi manufacturing facility in Karnataka. The lockout has been underway since March 16.

Talking to our sister magazine Autocar Professional today morning, Prasanna Kumar, the president of the TKM Workers Union, said the company declared the lockout illegally on Sunday (March 16) without giving any prior notice. He said the lockout was declared at a time when the union was negotiating with the company management about a wage hike. While the carmaker was willing to give a wage hike of Rs 3,050, the union had initially asked for Rs 8,000.

However, the union is now ready to lower its demand for a wage hike to convince the management to lift the lockout. However, Prasanna Kumar said the management “should fix the pay hike reasonably and not at very low levels.” Kumar said another round of a tripartite meeting will be held today (March 20) in the Karnataka labour commissioner’s office. “We are hopeful that the company will lift the lockout after this meeting today evening,” he added. Earlier the TKM management claimed that a certain section of employees had resorted to deliberate stoppages of the production line, abuse and threatening of supervisors, thereby continuously disrupting business for the past 25 days that led to the company declaring a lockout at the manufacturing plant. However, the labour union leader disagreed with this and said, “We have not been involved in any anti-labour activities. We were peacefully negotiating for our wage hike that has been due for 2013-2014.”

If the company fails to lift the lockout soon, the workers union is exploring the possibility of taking legal action, he added. Out of TKM’s total workforce of 6,500 employees, around 4,000 workers are attached to the TKM Workers Union while the remaining are in the management category, said Prasanna Kumar. The workers union president alleged that the company is carrying out production inside the factory with a limited number of unskilled management staff. He added that the vehicle stock in the factory may not exceed 500 units at present. On March 19 late evening, TKM issued a statement saying that another round of meeting will be held today with the deputy labour commissioner.

Since the lockout began on March 16, tripartite meetings involving TKM management, the workers union and the labour department have been held twice and once with the state labour minister but no solution has been arrived yet. TKM, which has market leadership in the MPV segment with its Innova, has two manufacturing units at its integrated factory complex in Bidadi industrial estate with a combined annual production capacity of 310,000 units. It is learnt that the TKM plant in Bidadi was manufacturing around 750 to 800 vehicles every day spanning six models including the Innova, Fortuner, Corolla, Etios and Camry. Toyota Motor Corporation holds the majority stake of 89 percent in TKM while the remaining 11 percent is held by the Kirloskar Group. TKM's Bidadi plant has seen labour strife before. Earlier in January 2006, the carmaker had declared a 15-day lockout following a worker strike related to wage negotiations.