Federations lodge complaint

Defence employee federations representing unions of ordnance factories on Wednesday lodged a complaint with the Chief Labour Commissioner, Ministry of Labour and Employment, against the Department of

Defence employee federations representing unions of ordnance factories on Wednesday lodged a complaint with the Chief Labour Commissioner, Ministry of Labour and Employment, against the Department of Defence Production alleging violation of conciliation proceedings on the strike notice dated August 4, 2020. In their joint letter, the All India Defence Employees' Federation (AIDEF), Indian National Defence Workers' Federation (INDWF), and Bharatiya Pratiraksha Mazdoor Sangh (BPMS) have complained that the Department of Defence Production has reneged on the agreement in respect of strike demands that it will abide by the provisions of Sec. 33(1) of Industrial Disputes Act 1947 in lieu of the federations accepting to defer the proposed indefinite strike from October 12, 2020. At a meeting convened on October 29 for eliciting an alternative proposal for improving the performance of the Ordnance Factory Board, the federations came up with a proposal on November 20,2020, for restructuring the OFB to achieve ₹ 30,000 crore production target during the next five years, general secretary of AIDEF C. Srikumar said. The proposal was further revised and submitted on February 12, 2021. At a time when the federations were awaiting the next round of discussion, the EGOM (Empowered Group of Ministers) meeting was convened on March 2 to discuss modalities for implementation of Corporatisation of OFB.