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Here are some responses from Indian print-media on the Gurgaon incident:

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THE HINDU

Force as the first recourse

Force, it seems, is no longer the last resort for key contingents of the Indian police. Police personnel tend to wield batons and firearms at the slightest hint of trouble in `law and order' situations. The Gurgaon lathi-charge on workers of Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India Limited demanding reinstatement of dismissed colleagues is another reminder of mindless brutality in the system. Whether the Haryana police provoked the workers by their unreasonable, partisan stance or it was the other way about will be established in the judicial inquiry that has been ordered. According to preliminary media reports, workers who went to submit a memorandum were surrounded and lathi-charged; and the police response to the blockade and throwing of stones by some protesters was grossly disproportionate. The police version, expectedly, is completely different. But even if it is conceded there was provocation from a few workers in the course of a protest road blockade, there was absolutely no warrant for the police to launch themselves into the savage baton-wielding mode satellite television images captured powerfully to the shock of viewers across the country. When citizens see for themselves `law-enforcers' behaving like goons, the impact on the public image of the police can be imagined. Instead of intelligently and fairly handling the labour protest, the police cracked down on the crowd, leaving hundreds of people, predominantly workers, wounded.
Police personnel should be educated and trained to behave like custodians of the law, not outlaws somehow empowered by the law. Unfortunately, brutal behaviour among police personnel is a malaise that is widespread enough to raise apprehensions about the system itself. For too long, the law and order machinery has not been accountable to the people. This is because the police are perceived, with honourable exceptions, to be agents and accomplices of the economically and politically powerful. Quite often, ruling politicians find in the police a useful tool to settle political or business scores. Virtually every time the rule of law is subverted by the police, the sufferers are the most vulnerable sections of the society. In the absence of any corrective, public trust in the police force is likely to get eroded even further. That will only aid lawlessness, not the cause of public order the police force is mandated to serve. The Gurgaon incident set off an uproar in Parliament, with the Opposition as well as the Left parties strongly condemning the police savagery. But the Bhupinder Singh Hooda Government, tactless in its handling of the workers' protest on Monday, has compounded the bungling by its continued ineptitude and insensitivity in tackling the situation arising out of it. If anything, the happenings on Tuesday — the police and protesters engaged in pitched battles — have tarnished the Congress regime's image all the more. This is the time for the party high command to act firmly.

--------The Hindu

--PTI


Gurgaon residents and relatives of injured gather outside the Civil Hospital on Tuesday, where the wounded were admitted on Monday after clashes with police.



Malls of the few, chawls of the many
P. Sainath

The scenes from Gurgaon gave us more than just a picture of one labour protest, police brutality or corporate tyranny. It presented us a microcosm of the new and old Indias. Different rules and realities for different classes of society.
A HORRIBLY oppressed wife, so runs the old American joke, slapped her husband in despair. The man punched her over 30 times, till she lay battered and he was exhausted by the effort. Then, panting, he told her: "Now we're even." That's right. Both sides were violent weren’t they?


An angry woman whose brother is missing since Monday tries to snatch a baton from a policeman, as she made a vain bid to enter the Civil Hospital in Gurgaon on Tuesday.

That's pretty much the both-sides-did-it line, now in vogue to describe the brutality in Haryana. Months of being denied their rights, the ruthless cutting of their jobs, the despair of the workers, count for little. The breaking of the nation's laws, the torment of the sacked workers, their wives and children count for less. Context counts for nothing at all. History begins with the televised violence of two days. Not with the hidden violence of years.
Even those 48 hours are instructive. On the one hand, hundreds thrashed mercilessly by the police. Some still being clubbed as they lay bleeding on the ground. Hundreds missing. Lathis, teargas, water canons and other action from the police. One woman sick with anxiety, swinging a stick at them — shown ad nauseum on every channel. That, and some stone-throwers targeting cops in bullet-proof vests, neatly symbolised the match-up. Yup, both sides were violent.
The Haryana police lived up to their history. At the best of times, this force would not win a prize in any human rights competition. (Unless the only other contestants were Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and the Punjab police. The race might then be close.) This is the state of Jhajar, where five Dalits were lynched by a mob. Their crime: they were suspected of killing a cow. The Haryana police swung into action as only they could, filing cases against those they suspected of cow slaughter. Then too, only nationwide outrage saw matters go further. Then too, the site was close enough to the capital city for the media to take notice.
Yet the present violence in Haryana speaks of newer things as well. There was something quite symbolic about Gurgaon being the venue of the protests. About "old" Gurgaon being the scene of bloodshed and mayhem. While "new" Gurgaon with its bustling, happy, mall culture, saw business as usual. Gurgaon's mall has won the attention of media the world over. Many well-known papers, notably, the New York Times, have added lustre to its legend.
On Tuesday, one television channel was smart enough to see the contrast. The clearly better-off (and for now unaffected) having their hot dogs and coleslaw in the Mall. While the plebs battled the cops at the barricades in "old" Gurgaon. In that is a parable of an old and new India as well.
This time, much of the media got the picture, but many of them missed the point. Two channels at least, told us the police were showing "maximum" and "extreme" restraint. This against a background (reported by the same channels) of hundreds missing. Of injured persons being frogmarched from hospital to lock-ups. And of frightened people searching for their relatives. This, too, alongside visuals of police battering unarmed people lying helpless on the ground. I guess that's the maximum restraint the Haryana police are capable of, anyway.
The second day's violence was reportedly sparked off when frantic members of the public who turned up at the civil hospital could not find their relatives. Some of these seem to have been whisked away by police to be charged with the previous day's violence. That inflamed matters. Note that some non-involved citizens of "old" Gurgaon got quickly involved. What they had seen angered them. And anyway, their anger had other causes, too. Oddly, those pushing the "both-sides-were-violent" line seek no action against the police. Both sides were violent, right? How come one side faces no punishment?
Gurgaon was about the police and administration increasingly acting as enforcement agents of big corporations. Not without precedent in the past. But more and more a symbol of the new India. It has been happening for some years in Kashipur and other parts of Orissa. There, police and local officials have functioned almost as a private army of the mining companies. Opposition leaders, even elected representatives, have been attacked when reaching there to inquire into the violence.

In Haryana, Honda did not even have to come into the picture till things went awfully wrong. The police and administration were there to act on its behalf. Had this incident occurred in Japan, where Honda has large unions to deal with, some of its top brass would have been seeking new employment. Here, they've just begun to talk about giving back some of the workers their jobs.
Japan's Ambassador to India says this episode might prove bad for our image as an investment destination. Gee! I'm sure that warning will send all those terrified women searching for their relatives scurrying back to their homes in shame. What's a few breadwinners when the image of India as an investment destination is at stake? That mindset too, is symbolic of the new India. Remember those editorial writers whose horror over the pogroms in Gujarat was roused not so much by the misery of the victims as by the damage to India's image as an investment destination? They're back.
It's not all about Honda, either. Haryana has seen many brutal actions against workers in the past decade. In 1996, over 18,000 safai karamcharis struck work across that State for 80 days. They were not seeking a paisa extra in wages or benefits. They had a single demand. They wanted their wages paid on time. They sometimes went months without getting paid.
In response, the then Bansi Lal Government sacked 6,000 of them. Close to 700 women found themselves jailed for up to 70 days under the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA). This had not happened even during the Emergency. This is the State of which an editorial says approvingly: "Historically, Haryana has been a State without labour unrest. This has made it a sought after destination for investment... " It has in fact been a region of severe labour suppression. The editorial worries about finding "a more enlightened and less brutal way" of "dispersing a crowd." Such kindness. It might also be enlightened to respect the basic rights of people. Haryana is notorious for a labour department that will not register trade unions formed by workers.
All such government actions were, of course, aimed at privatising services like sanitation. In 2001, the Punjab & Haryana High Court ordered the reinstatement of over 1,000 workers of the Faridabad municipal corporation. The corporation had privatised sanitation work — to an "NGO" — for "a monthly fee." The then Mayor admitted the "experiment" had failed. The fate of the Rs.2.5 million monthly fee is best guessed at. The court held the retrenchment to be wrong. Some courts still do such things. That's why governments are so keen to change labour laws. That too, reflects the new India.
Successive governments in Haryana have allowed companies to ride roughshod over workers' rights. And though quite a few of new India's elite may not know it, trade unions are still legal in the country. For now, anyway. It would be worth looking at how much media coverage there has been of workers' problems here. (Or anywhere else.) In what depth have the often illegal practices of managements been covered? How many working class families have been rendered destitute in the town of the Great Mall?
How many channels or big newspapers even have full-time correspondents on the labour beat? That too in a country where just the job seekers at the employment exchanges almost equal the population of South Africa?
In Mumbai, the Mall itself has been built on the retrenched future of the workers. On mill lands and on work they've been cheated off. And laws have been stretched or changed. You can open a bowling alley and evade the rules by dubbing it "a workers' recreation centre." You can see both new and old India cheek by jowl here.
When entities closely linked to two top Shiv Sena leaders buy former mill lands for Rs. 421 crore, you'd think there would be much curiosity. At least about where the money came from. That too, when one of them happens to be a former Chief Minister and the other a Thackeray. There's far more, though, about the "record" nature of the deal. And excitement over what will come up. A grand mall? Or residential complexes?
The streets of Gurgaon gave us a glimpse of something larger than a single protest. Bigger than a portrait of the Haryana police. Greater than Honda. Far more complex than the "image of India" as an investment destination. It presented us a microcosm of the new and old Indias. Of private cities and gated communities. Of different realities for different classes of society. Of ever-growing inequality. Of the malls of the few and the chawls of the many.



A bystander tries to run away as policemen baton charge in Gurgaon on Tuesday when women and men armed with truncheons and stones attacked police. According to some around 700 people are "missing".
Photo by: AP
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The New Indian Express

Kurukshetra
Wednesday July 27 2005 08:47 IST

Nobody who saw images of Haryana policemen beating up agitating workers from Honda Motors’ factory in Gurgaon could have been left unmoved. Indeed, a heavy-handed use of the truncheon is the abiding identity of police forces across India. There must be a more enlightened and less brutal way of dispersing a crowd. Having said that, it would be prudent to look at the wider implications of Monday’s tragedy, now being quickly reduced to a farce. What the police encountered was not an orderly demonstration. Peaceful marchers don’t walk out with sticks and stones and the occasional spear. The near lynching of the deputy commissioner when he visited the injured in hospital was no doubt evidence of anger. Even so, it is difficult to escape the impression that it was also a ‘‘show’’ for the accompanying media.

Historically, Haryana has been a state without labour unrest. This has made it a sought after destination for investment, created jobs and attracted migrants — white collar and blue collar — from across India. One frenzied afternoon cannot be allowed to wipe away that reality. Unfortunately, that is not how the gaggle of fellow travellers who have descended upon Gurgaon seem to see it. Already some of them have called for a day-long strike in the city, realising full well what this will do to morale in the call centre/BPO industry that has made Gurgaon a byword for Indian infotech. The Congress, which runs the state government, is yet again caught in no man’s land, dependent as it is on the Left at the Centre. A combination of political diffidence and rampaging, out-of-date rhetoric can send all the wrong signals. This is not the 1980s, where India is a bit player in a fragmented world economy; this is a globalised world, where India is on the edge of the big league. As such, every move it makes is watched, interpreted and, sometimes, overstated by the omnipresent television camera. One labour dispute in one factory in one town can be magnified into a far bigger crisis than it is.

The Left obviously sees political potential in bringing militant trade unionism to Delhi’s doorstep. It is a sobering thought that the very phenomenon has reduced the stretch from Kanpur to Kolkata to an industrial wasteland. That is why it is important to recognise the Gurgaon violence as a horrible aberration — not a televised episode of class struggle.



Protestors attack policemen during a violent demonstration as pitched battles, that began Monday, continued between riot police and Honda workers in Gurgaon on Tuesday.
Photo by: Ramesh Sharma



It was a sad, bad aberration

Colourful, over-the-top language is no stranger to Indian public life. Even by its standards, though, the past two days have been extraordinary. It began on Monday evening, when a Haryana politician — probably still suffering the hangover of the silly controversy over the prime minister’s Oxford speech — compared the Gurgaon lathi charge to Jallianwala Bagh. The theme was soon adopted by the Left. One communist leader after another began comparing the Raj’s most diabolical massacre Raj to what was, really, a relatively minor case of labour unrest related to one factory. On Wednesday, Comrade A.B. Bardhan took matters further. He made menacing sounds about Honda dealerships across the country being targeted, all because a Honda unit had sacked four workers for alleged indiscipline. So where will this end? In a boycott of sushi bars? Perhaps to take matters to their logical absurdity, the CPI must now demand that small shopkeepers — whom, in any case, it is protecting from the bad wolf of big retail — stop using Honda generators to escape power cuts, which, in turn, can end only with electricity reforms the Left refuses to allow!
The satisfaction of soundbites notwithstanding, there is a serious issue here. When faced with crisis, mature politicians — particularly those backing the government — usually make sobering noises. The CPI and CPI(M) follow an entirely contrarian policy. Ever since the UPA government was formed in May 2004, they have gone TV studio-hopping with one incendiary statement after another. Within days of the Manmohan Singh ministry taking office, they talked down — rather, shouted down — the market. Now, excited at the idea of forming trade unions in the automobile industry — the manufacturing success story of post-liberalisation India — they are spraying FDI repellants again.
Having scored initial points and put the Congress on the backfoot, the Left should now calm down. If its penchant for dramatic press briefings leads, for instance, to even one major incident of vandalism, the damage to India — and to the UPA arrangement that gives the comrades their current clout — will be incalculable. The Honda factory has resumed production, bolstered by temporary workers who only want to make an honest living. The CPI-CPI(M) combo, too, should get on with life.
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THE PIONEER

Futile strike
The Pioneer Edit Desk

The vivid televised images of the primitive ham-handedness of Haryana Police while dealing with rioting workers of Honda Motorcycles & Scooters India Ltd in Gurgaon should not be allowed to divert attention from the real issue at stake.


The dispute between the management of this joint venture company, set up with significant Japanese investment, and its workers essentially stems from disagreement over the need for shop-floor discipline to ensure optimum production. In the pre-liberalisation era, labour indiscipline, coupled with militant trade unionism, fetched ruination upon innumerable public and private sector enterprises, pauperising investors and workers alike.

If there were any winners, they were trade union leaders, especially card-carrying Communists, who remained untouched by the plight of workers rendered jobless by the reckless denudation of India's industrial landscape. Tragically, while new industrial and investment laws in the post-liberalisation era have encouraged the regeneration and growth of private enterprise funded by foreign investment, the attitude of labour remains largely unreformed. This is because nothing has been done to reframe labour laws so that they are in tune with contemporary realities and harmonise the interests of both workers and investors.



A policeman attempts to retaliate against protestors at a market area in Gurgaon, where armed women and men attacked police on Tuesday for the second straight day. Photo by: AP


Nor has Government bothered to tame predatory, red flag-waving trade union leaders who feed on labour grievances that can be amicably resolved through direct negotiations without Marx-spouting middlemen and engineer disruptive strikes of the kind witnessed this week in Gurgaon so that they can fatten themselves on settlement money extorted from owners of affected units. While it is unlikely that foreign investors, unlike gutless Indian entrepreneurs of the pre-liberalisation era, will succumb to the blackmailing tactics of trade union leaders and their fellow travellers, it is more than likely that workers led astray by vacuous sloganeering will be left high and dry.

Those who feel persuaded to sympathise with Gurgaon's rioting workers and their duplicitous Leftist champions should pause for a moment and consider the consequences of the violence. Images of workers assaulting police personnel in uniform and then being beaten black and blue, of vehicles being set ablaze, and of otherwise mature politicians mouthing the most inane statements in order to play to the gallery, cannot be expected to inspire confidence among investors, whether at home or abroad. Gurgaon has emerged as a major platform for foreign investment and a perch for several major multi-national corporations. Gurgaon's rapid industrialisation has generated a huge number of jobs as well as revenue for Government.

The remarkable infrastructure development witnessed in Gurgaon bears testimony to the larger benefits that accrue from foreign investment-fuelled industrial growth. Compare this with the industrial wasteland to which Faridabad has been reduced because of labour indiscipline and militant trade unionism. Compare, too, this prosperity with the destruction of industry in West Bengal by those who claim to protect workers rights. It would be churlish to argue in defence of brigands posing as policemen.

But it would be disastrous to so much as suggest that perhaps the marauding workers on Gurgaon's streets, whose irresponsible action may reduce hundreds of families to penury if the affected unit shuts shop, have a case worth listening to. Meanwhile, the Left deserves to be castigated in the severest of terms for undermining India's growth. This is a war between Marx and market. The choice is clear.


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THE TIMES OF INDIA

Reality Check
[ THURSDAY, JULY 28, 2005 12:00:00 AM ]

Don't get hysterical about Gurgaon, learn from Bengal The workers' unrest at the Honda factory in Gurgaon, which led to police violence, now threatens to go out of control. Bajrang Dal goons have jumped into the action, the BJP wants the Congress government of Haryana to be sacked, the CPI has likened the violence to the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre, during which about 400 people were machine-gunned to death in Amritsar, and called a countrywide strike on July 29. Leaders of the CPM are muttering darkly about how capitalism — and multinationals — oppress the working class. Before shrillness drowns out reason, here is a reality check. It is pointless to blame foreign investment (FDI), multinationals or the Japanese for what happened in Gurgaon. India's experience with FDI has been overwhelmingly positive for employees, share-holders and institutions. Reforms in many areas, including infrastructure and capital markets, have been driven by the demands of overseas investors. Across sectors, multi-nationals have boosted wages and improved the quality of manpower management: witness the rush to join multi-national employers during campus placements. Are the Japanese any different? Delhi's comrades should talk to Nirupam Sen, industry minister of Bengal, home to one of Japan's biggest investments in India: A Rs 2,000-crore petrochemicals factory at Haldia. Sen can tell them that Mitsubishi has done so well that additional Japanese investments are lined up. Forget the rhetoric of the Left and Hindutva fana-tics, overseas investments are doing India a world of good. As manufacturing grows and expectations rise, India will need mechanisms to deal with labour disputes. An obvious thing to do is to reform our decrepit labour laws, something that Delhi's Leftists oppose. State administrations also need lessons on how to manage labour disputes with minimum fuss. They should learn from the Left government in Bengal, once an enemy and now a great pal of capitalism. On Tuesday, the government, managements and unions resolved a 15-day strike of tea workers in the state. Unions wanted a 50% hike in daily wages — about Rs 25 per day — and had blocked attempts to introduce productivity-linked wages. The final deal has hiked wages by only 5% and pushed the productivity-linked scheme through. Now, those who cross targets will get bonuses but laggards will be penalised. It took the Bengal government less than a fortnight to hammer out the deal. Compare that with trouble at Honda, which has been simmering for around eight months now. There are lessons to be learnt from Bengal's Left. Comrades in Delhi better listen up.







700 workers injured in clash with Gurgaon police

[ MONDAY, JULY 25, 2005 11:51:57 PM ]

Police beat up protesters after dismissed workers blocked a highway and later attacked a small police squad escorting them in Gurgaon.( AFP )
GURGAON: At least 75 workers were rushed to hospital and many more injured when incensed Haryana policemen went berserk and thrashed agitating workers of Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India (HMS here on Monday. Trouble broke out when the workers, staging a protest march, were confronted by police in the Civil Lines area. On being held back, the workers injured a deputy superintendent of police and set fire to the SDM’s vehicle. This acted as a trigger for the police to unleash massive retaliatory violence. Chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda has ordered an inquiry into the police action, termed by Gurgaon deputy commissioner Sudhir Rajpal as "operations conducted within the boundaries of law". Rajpal insisted the mob had to be controlled after it had indulged in violence. Eyewitnesses, however, said the policemen were not so much interested in dispersing the mob, as to thrash the workers black and blue by ringing them in from all sides. It appears the initial violence was difficult for the police to stomach and it was determined to teach the workers a lesson. The protest had begun from Kamla Nehru Park and was to reach the mini secretariat near Rajiv Chowk. It's here that workers burnt the SDM's car and injured the DSP. As the workers marched towards the mini secretariat, SSP Yogender Nehra ordered a lathicharge. After beating the workers into submission — and indeed some of them senseless — the police pressed home its advantage by heaping humiliation. The workers were made to hold their ears, and crouch while running, among other things. The company — Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India Ltd — clarified that it had nothing to do with the incident. Terming it as "unfortunate", a company spokesman pointed out that the violence had taken place outside the factory. He urged the workers to come back and rejoin work. The workers' agitation is now about a fortnight old. They have been asking for higher wages in light of improved company performance. The management claims it has reached an agreement with workers but adds that "outside elements" were still "misleading" them.