Over a week since protests began, no let-up in HAL strike as crisis continues

Agencies
October 22, 2019

Bengaluru, Oct 22: The indefinite strike by the workers of the state-run Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) for wage revision continued on the 8th day, with the trade unions and management hardening their positions, an official said on Monday.

"There Bengais a production loss as nearly 20,000 workers are on strike since October 14 despite 8,000 officers and 11,000 contract employees reporting to duty," the official told IANS.

Refuting the management claim that the strike had not grounded the company's operations, HAL trade union General Secretary S. Chandrasekhar said as officers don't work on the shop floor or operate any machine, work at all the nine production units has halted.

"The officers and their executives don't operate machinery as their work is confined to supervising, planning and inspecting. The contract workers can't do much without the skilled workforce on duty," Chandrashekar said in a statement later.

Accusing HAL Chairman R. Madhavan of giving step-motherly treatment to the workers, the union leader said the financial crisis in the company had not prevented the management from extending benefits to executives but not increase the workers' wages.

The 55-year-old aerospace major has six production complexes in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Koraput in Odisha, Korwa and Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh and Nashik in Maharashtra and three research and development (R&D) centres across the country.

The company has petitioned the Karnataka High Court for a direction to the workforce to withdraw the strike and report to work.

The unions have sought a wage revision given to the executives, a gross salary hike of 35 per cent, including 110-140 per cent hike in perks.

The wage revision is due since January 1, 2017, as the previous two revisions were in 2012 and 2007 for 5 years, respectively.

About 10,000 employees work in the company's Bengaluru production complex and the remaining 10,000 in eight locations across the country.

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News Network
February 2,2020

New Delhi, Jan 2: India on Sunday reported the second case of novel coronavirus with a person from Kerala with a travel history to China testing positive, officials said.

"The patient has tested positive for novel coronavirus and is in isolation in a hospital," the health ministry said.

The patient is stable and is being closely monitored, it said.

India's first novel coronavirus case in India was also reported from Kerala with a student testing positive.

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News Network
May 23,2020

Bengaluru, May 22: Police commissioner Bhaskar Rao on Friday said the next two Sundays will be ‘full curfew days’ and the city will be under complete lockdown between 7pm Saturday and 7am Monday.

Addressing the media, the top cop said all essential services will be excluded from the curfew. “People attending weddings and other ceremonies can travel. Those wanting to buy food products or medicines too can step out. However, like in lockdown 1.0, people found loitering unnecessarily will be punished,” he said.

According to Rao, city roads will be barricaded like how it was done during lockdown 1.0 and 2.0.

A senior police officer told TOI that during this period, vehicles could be seized under the Disaster Management Act-2005. “So, we request the public not to come out unnecessarily. If we find people roaming in vehicles, we shall seize the rides and owners will have to approach the court later to get them released,” he said.

The government has extended the lockdown till May 31, which includes two Sundays.
Earlier in the day, the state government allowed inter-state travel from Karnataka with the consent of the receiving state. Praveen Sood, Karnataka DG and IGP, said, “Inter-state pass is not required to go out of Karnataka as long as you have the consent of the receiving state. Due to the lockdown, migrant workers, pilgrims, tourists, students and other persons are stranded at different places. They would be allowed to move as usual.”

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News Network
July 14,2020

Udupi, July 14: Due to rising COVID-19 cases in this district, Deputy Commissioner G Jagadeesh on Tuesday, announced that the border will be sealed down from July 15.

Speaking to newsmen here on Tuesday, he said “Inter-district travelers will not be allowed to enter Udupi for 14 days from 8 pm on Wednesday, however, we won’t be imposing complete lockdown in the district.”

The decision was taken in the meeting held in his chamber in which Legislators Haladi Srinivas Shetty (Kundapur), Sunil Kumar (Karkala), Rghupathi Bhat (Udupi), Sukumar Shetty (Byndoor), among others were present.

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