What Price To Pay For ‘Progress’

I have always wondered what impact retirement has on the lives of workers. Arvind Shrouti and I decided to speak to retirees. I have used the word ‘retirement’ in a broad sense to include any loss of job, voluntary or otherwise. Some employees may have lost jobs due to closure of establishment, some may have voluntarily taken retirement, and a few may have been coerced into ‘retirement.’

Three employees of Racold met me in Arvind Shrouti’s office at Chinchwad. I had met them on an earlier occasion so there was comfort of familiarity. They had read my blogposts on Racold. I had interacted mostly with Satish Yende who was the General Secretary of the Racold Unit of Poona Employees Union which is affiliated to AITUC.

Satish was an affable person who would not fit into the popular image of a union leader. He was not aggressive and would look for a solution to any issue on the hand. Racold closed their plant at Chakan suddenly and without notice in November 2018 and Satish, like all employees, lost his job.

Unfortunately, Satish met his untimely death in June 2021 during the Corona epidemic.

‘He was too young to pass away,’ I observed, ‘He must have been in his early forties’

‘Yes, he was forty-one. Corona took him away from us. Many have survived the epidemic, but he could not.’

‘There is a belief that people do not die of disease; they die when they lose the zeal and hope to live.’

‘Oh! What about his family?’

‘He left behind his wife and two little daughters.’

‘They must have gone through a big turmoil. Emotional turmoil.’

‘Yes indeed, like all of us.’

‘What did Satish do for living?’

‘He partnered with a friend to buy a car, and they used to run it for Ola and Uber in a 12-hour shift each’

‘Yes, 12-hour shift. We do not get much income.’ One of the three workers spoke.

‘Sir, he also runs his car for Ola and Uber.’

‘We must work for at least 12 hours to earn about a thousand rupees. And we must set aside at least three hundred rupees a day to cover the cost of maintenance.’

‘This situation was completely unwarranted. The Racold management played a game with us, and we took long time to realise how carefully it was planned and executed.’

‘They told us that there was a change in technology which was forcing them to make changes. They gave voluntary retirement benefit of Rs 50 Lakhs to twenty-five of our members in a hush hush manner so that they could effectively bring the number of people below 100. Effectively they broke our union. You do not require government’s permission to close a unit if the strength is less than 100 for over a year. Racold closed the unit suddenly in November 2018.’

‘We would have accepted retirement if they were to offer the same benefit which they offered to our twenty-five colleagues. Fifty lakhs! Maybe we could have negotiated it. On the day of Diwali when we had four-days holiday, they gave us sweets but credited closure compensation with notice pay to our bank accounts and sent the termination letters by post.’

‘Many employees received the letter when they were shopping for the Diwali festival. They threw the sweets box away. It was a big betrayal. Do they train managers to act against employees and against basic values of fair play?’

‘It was a cunning and clever ploy. In 2017, a year before the sudden closure they signed an agreement with us increasing our pay by Rs 13700 pm. Was that a step in the direction of closure or of running the business?’

The deep animosity and feeling of betrayal were evident. Racold has been a part of an Italian company. (The Italian parent company of Racold is Ariston Thermo Group). Representations made to the Italian company were cold-shouldered – ‘we will act in conformity with the law of the land’ was the answer. Acts can be legal, and acts can be justifiable. But not every legal act is justifiable.

‘What was the age group of employees?’ I asked. Loss of job hurts particularly those who are middle aged. It hurts everybody, but the impact is relatively less if one is close to retirement.

‘Almost all were in the age group 42-45 years. The children were in school, some were or nearing 10^th or 12^th standard which are critical years in a student’s academic career which also shapes their future. It deeply hurts parents see their children’s future sabotaged.’

‘Did you say sabotaged?’

‘What else was that sir?’

‘One among us had enrolled his daughter in a very good school. He was left with no choice but to put her in ZP (Zilla Parishad) School. Less said the better about the quality of teaching in ZP school.’

‘That’s a big fall.’

‘Yes, indeed. And it is difficult to live with it. Not only for us but also for our family. We protect our children from the fallout of our unemployment, but it is not possible to insulate them. And it hurts.’

‘Children sense the tension and stress which their parents are feeling. They get confused. They do not know how to respond to this sudden twist in the fortune.’

‘My daughter’s school was planning a tour. I came to know of it. I asked my daughter why she did not mention it to me. She asked me if I could bear the burden of the tour fee. They stop asking if anything involves money.’

‘The dialogue in the family stops or suffers badly.’

‘My son enrolled for engineering course. One day over dinner I asked him if his studies were going well. He could not eat his food, he started crying. It was a heart-rending sight to watch my son at the dinner crying inconsolably with his food plate in front of him.’

‘What happened?’

‘‘Dad, where is the time to study,’ he asked. He had to change three busses to reach his institute and similar way to return. It often took five hours of travel. He thought that staying in a hostel at Pune would be impossible given our financial situation. He was not wrong, but he had never asked me. Having realised his situation, I somehow got him hostel accommodation.’

‘Oh!’

‘And my daughter asked, she was studying in class 10, if I could afford to educate her beyond matriculation. She did not express this, but I guess girls in this situation feel that their future may be sacrificed in favour of son’s education. I try to listen to the unsaid.’

‘Sir, this would not have been the case had they not thrown us on the street. A few employees have sent their children to their native place. The quality of education in the villages is very poor. Some students returned to Chakan where their parents stay. The students could not adjust to the schools in the villages. What can we to do?’

‘Not only the young generation is affected but so also the older generation. Our parents are about 70 years old. They require medical attention, and a good amount of money must be spent on their medicines. We have extended the Mediclaim policy, but it is not enough, and any expense is a problem for us.’

‘That’s true. I know a case where our colleague could not afford buying Calcium tablets for his old aunt which she had to take every day.’

‘This situation came with so many problems we were not prepared for. Education of children and medicines for old parents were common concerns. But in some cases, there was deep suspicion and a feeling of betrayal.’

‘What are you referring to?’

‘A few young employees had got married just before the Racold closure. In their cases their in-laws accused them of misrepresenting the facts about employment before marriage. A village girl agrees to a marriage if the bridegroom has a permanent job and a house. Many of our employees had both. When the job loss came the in-laws felt cheated. Our union had to show papers to them to convince them that it was misfortune and not misrepresentation.’

‘Sad story of young couples. They got into the trouble almost immediately after marriage.’

‘Corona made our life even more difficult. We lost the job in November 2018. Corona hit us in 2020. Those two years were the worst years of our lives.’

‘That’s true. Some friends had nothing to eat. They worked as casual labourers – you find them standing at a ‘chowk’ waiting for a contractor to pick them up for job like painting, on daily wages and they felt humiliated. They had done no wrong to deserve this fate.’

‘Almost all of us have come to the city from villages in search of jobs. We studied in ITIs (Industrial Training Institute) to learn the skill of welding and the like. Back there in the villages, some of us held ‘yellow’ ration cards. (Yellow ration cards are given to families whose annual income is less than Rs.15000/-. Antyodaya Ration Card – These ration cards are given to low-income families from Below Poverty Line beneficiaries.) At Racold, our salary ranged between 40 to 50 thousand rupees a month. It was a dream job. Now our earnings are negligible. We are afraid we will be back to square one with this unemployment.’

‘What happens to the dialogue between the husband and wife?’ I asked.

There was long silence. Two of them wiped tears.

‘Stress takes the toll. Dialogue suffers. Beyond a certain limit they realise that their life is linked to ours, and they must suffer. No way out. We want to give them and our children a good life. But it is not going to be.’

‘I bought nice present for her on our every wedding anniversary and her birthday each year. Now I don’t. She noticed it, but did not say a word.’

‘Our relatives are also behaving with us differently. Now we feel that they respected us because we were financially in a good position, and with the job loss the respect is also lost.’

‘What do you do now? Working anywhere?’

‘Yes, I am selling auto spare parts.’

‘What’s your experience like?’

‘Terrible. I am trained to do welding. I am not trained for a selling job. And it is difficult to survive in this small industry. The dealers to whom I sell auto spare parts do not pay on time. Collection of outstanding bills is a huge problem. They take credit much beyond the agreed days. Part payments are common. All this affects my earnings.’

‘Two among us engage in ‘Intra-day trading.’ On share markets. But that requires a lot of study. We are not trained for share market trading. We neither have the capital nor the skill. And it is not a good idea to take risk with money at this juncture.’

Loss of identity is a huge problem for all. That is coupled with a sense of betrayal by the employer. Three generations are affected – children’s education, well-being of the senior citizens – parents of the employees – and the employees themselves.

It is not just loss of identity; it is also loss of social status. Everyone wants to move up the social ladder and they had moved up. But only to fall!

The union has started legal process against Racold but is long drawn if not killing the hapless employees. Gradually people are adjusting to the harsh realities of the life without employment.

The question is should this have happened as it did? Who is responsible? ‘Leaders’ have not taken up their case, lives of three generations have been affected – of the workers, their children and their parents who are dependent on them. So, for every worker, five more persons are adversely affected. About 90 workers were retrenched so totally 540 lives are adversely affected.

What a price to pay for ‘progress’!

Vivek S Patwardhan

“What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” All work copyrighted.