Today, I met Shri K.Vallinayagam, General Secretary of FNTO at his office. It has been some time since we met.I intimated him about the JAC decision to go on one day strike on 15th November 2011 against VRS, curtailment of existing benefits, settlement of ITS absorption etc.and requested that FNTO also join the main stream of struggle. We discussed the issues in detail. Shri Valli told me that he will discuss with his office-bearers and intimate about their decision.

BSNL is in acute financial difficulties. In 2010-11, it has posted a loss of around Rs. 6,000 crore. At the same time, about Rs. 4,000 to 5,000 crore dues to BSNL are yet to be recovered from the customers. The dues have been increasing year by year. No serious action has been take to recover these increasing due for the last so many years. When the issue was raised in the Parliament through M.P.s, the reply given was that necessary actions are being taken by the BSNL management. But as per the latest reports the dues have only increased.
It is high time that the management takes immediate and strong actions to recover the pending dues.

The Chief Economic Advisor to Government, Kaushik Basu, has stated that the increasing wages is the reason for the inflation. Wonderful!
The wages are increased mainly to catch up with the cost of living indexes caused due to increase in prices. Even then, only a portion of the increased prices are given by the government through increase in D.A. The Chief Economic Advisor is not against the high hikes of the top level management or corporates. He is pointing to the wages of the workers.
This statement is part of the strategy to attack the rights of the workers to increase their wages. It is such anti-people, anti-worker policies which has created anger amongst the people and resulted in agitations all over the world.

Shri Mallikarjun Kharge, Labour Minister, has stated that the Contract Labour Act will be changed to extend all benefits of the regular workers to the contract workers.Well Indeed.
What is happening in most of the industries and government departments is that even the provisions in the Contract Labour Act are not being implemented by the employers. Take for example the BSNL, a PSU formed out of the government department.
In BSNL in most of the places the Minimum Wage announced by the Central Government is not implemented. The Social Security measures like EPF, ESI etc. are not implemented. In many places, even the records are not maintained. The Bonus has been denied. Workers are being retrenched by the employer. There is no intervention by the government despite the facts brought to it’s notice.

Large number of police cordoned off the London Stock Exchange after the ‘Occupy London” movement started strengthening. The protesters are camping near the St. Paul’s Cathedral in the heart of the city. The protesters are demanding a ‘New Democratic Financial System’. The youngsters and unemployed are fed up with the present inequal system and want a change to the system.
The big growth story and increase in GDP etc. are all only beneficial to the corporates and big financiers. The ordinary people are suffering. The protests are going to spread to all the capitalist countries.

The Delhi State Government has increased the pension for Senior Citizens above 70 from Rs.1,000 to Rs. 1,500. For those below 70, it will continue as Rs. 1,000 only. According to a statement by the Delhi Government it is paying old-age pension to 3.16 lakh senior citizens.

The National Steering Committee against PFRDA Bill has decided to organise a Parliament March on 25th November 2011 against the PFRDA Bill. BSNLEU is also part of the committee. AIBDPA has also decided to participate in the March. It is a fight by the regular employees as well as pensioners to ensure that the future generations also get the pension unhindered. Details of the PFRDA Bill has been published in the blog earlier.

Taking inspiration from the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement in New York and other cities of US, the poor and the unemployed started ‘Occupy London’ agitation in London since Saturday. Several hundreds of protesters have demonstrated on 15th and it is continuing. They have put camps near the St. Paul’s Cathedral in the central of the city.
While in US the agitation is spreading with the protesters demonstrating in about 100 cities, such protests are spreading in the European cities also.The agitation is against the inequality as also against the bankers as others who are exploiting the people and taking all benefits. It is in fact an agitation against the system itself which had failed the common people. There is the chance to spread the agitation to more cities.

The deferred strike of the BSNL Workers will now be held on 15th November 2011. The strike was decided to be organised on 10th October by the JAC on very important demands. In order to bring wider unity, the JAC decided to defer the strike. On the basis of the discussions with NFTE and its agreement to have a common date for the strike, now it has been decided to organise the strike on 15th November 2011. Let all prepare for an effective and successful strike.

During the Kerala Circle Conference of BSNL Employees Union at Kannur on 12-14 October 2011, I had the rare opportunity of meeting a lot of comrades who have worked with me earlier, many of them retired now. It was a pleasure to meet the old friends and comrades and chat about the past, present and future with them. Since I have been away from them for many years, I could see the changes in their appearances which one could not have realised if he was in constant touch with them. It may be the same for them with regard to me.
Among them, there were two very old comrades, who are brothers, who had influenced me much. They are Comrades Narayanan Master and Anandan Master, both retired as Postmasters. Narayanan Master has been one of the cause for my entering the Pand T Department resigning from the post of a teacher. I used to go to the Post Office at Mattanur where he was the Postmaster to receive the mails. He advised me to apply for the P and T jobs. At that time the applications were called for by the PMG, Madras for the posts of Postal clerks, Telephone Operators, RMS Sorters and Telegraphists. I applied for all the four cadres and was selected for all. I sought the advise of Narayanan Master which to select. He advised me that it is better to select Telephones, since there was much more opportunities. I selected the same and went to training and joined as Telephone operator at Kottayam on 02-09-1958.
Comrade Anandan Master, the younger brother, was working at Kannur when I got transferred to Kannur in 1959. Along with Comrades N.P.Padmanabhan, T.M.Janardhanan and P.Narayanan (Telephones), he was also in the leadership of the NFPTE there.Till 1964, I was at Kannur and got the opportunity to work with the above comrades, through whom I could get a lot of experience in union activities. Comrades Pappettan, Janu Master and Narayanettan are no more. But Comrade Anandattan is still with us. He came to the conference and attended for some time.
With both I discussed our old times, the experiences of the historic strike of 1960 and the present situation. All of us were happy.
I met daughter of Anandattan, who is also an activist of BSNLEU.
I visited the memorials of Pappettan and Janu Master in the Payyambalam beach and paid homage.