Wage increase :

CWC's timely action made it possible

by P. Krishnaswamy

The Sunday Observer conducted an on-the-spot study on reactions of the plantation workers over the recent wage hike of Rs. 405 to them under a fresh biennial Collective Agreement signed between three major plantation trade unions and the plantation companies on September 16, with special focus on the situation in the estates prior to the agreement and after.

Negotiations between the three plantation trade unions - the Ceylon Workers' Congress (CWC), the Lanka Jathika Estate Workers' Union (LJEWU) and the Joint Plantation Trade Union Centre (JPTUC) -and the Planters' Association of Ceylon, representing 22 regional plantation Companies came to a deadlock last week after eleven rounds of talks since the expiry of the last Agreement on March 31, 2009. It was on the initiative of Plantation Industries Minister D. M. Jayaratna that compromise on a wage increase of Rs.405 became possible, Ministry sources said.

We visited estates in Watawala, Dickoya, Kotagala and Bogawantalawa and interviewed workers, both males and females, selected at random, holding membership in different plantation trade unions.

Some workers in Drayton Etate, Kotagala who were interviewed by the Sunday Observer appreciated the CWC and its leadership for their unrelenting efforts to make the plantation companies to agree to a reasonable wage increase. In the 160 year history of the plantation industry, the workers' wages were very low and stagnant for many decades. The CWC with its long trade union history waged continued struggles to win the socio-economic and political rights of the plantation workers. The present wage increase also became possible because of the timely action of the CWC and the non-cooperation campaign had not caused any financial Straits on the workers, they said. They were confident that the CWC would do everything necessary in the future for safeguarding their social and economic welfare and also for getting them a better wage increase, they said. A majority of the others interviewed expressed dissatisfaction over the wage increase, explaining their own reasons. But it was observed all of them returned to work on September 17, the day following the Agreement, restoring normalcy in the plantation areas in contrast to the situation on the days prior to the Agreement which were rocked by a widespread 'non-cooperation campaign', protest demonstrations and also high tension in some areas including in Bogawantalawa and Kotagala. A total of 30 female workers, including pluckers and factory workers, and 24 male workers, in the age group of 20-57, were interviewed in Carolina Estate, Watawala, Shannon Estate, Hatton, Dickoya Estate, Dickoya, Kottyagalla Estate, Bogwantalawa and Drayton Estate, Kotagala. A large percentage of them said that the wage increase of Rs. 405 would only fetch them the basic wage of Rs. 285. They would only be able to make ends meet if an amount Rs. 400 was paid as basic wage without any other incentive supplements to their wages. The basic wage now is 285 while the additional payment of Rs.120 (Rs. 30 for specified norms per day and Rs. 90 for 75 percent attendance ) was subject to unpracticable conditions and most of them would not qualify for those payments, they said. Their past experience was that due to reasons such as sickness of self or a family member, death of a neighbour, very bad climatic conditions and other social obligations a virtually all of them never qualified for the attendance bonus, they said.

Workers of an estate in Watawala said that they got an average of only two days' work on that estate and on the rest of the days they were transported to estates in Ginigathene and Dickoya, both about eight km away, for work. Several previously fertile tea fields were abandoned for years without manuring and other maintenance for producing 'Organic Tea' which also did not materialise. The fields, about seventy hectares in extent, were now covered by overgrowth of jungle trees and bushes with no prospects of producing tea crops in the future and this has led the management to send them to other estates to work, they said. Mother of an infant said she works only on days on which work is offered in the same estate because of her baby and her take-home pay is nil every month after deductions on advances she had taken.

According to our interviews among the workers in the five estates, most families had only two working members and an average of four dependants, including school-going children and ailing parents. Their daily expenditure on essential food items is between Rs. 400 - 450 while expenses on school-going children, including transport, and other expenses would add to that. Also most of them did not have plots of lands to cultivate vegetables or facilities to rare milching cows, he said.

Incidentally it was agonizing to see the sub-human transport facilities provided to the female workers taken for work in other estates, standing in packed lorries with gunny bags tied to their waists and headgears made up of polythene sheets as protection against rain and jutting branches of tea bushes.