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Labour group CITU-backed Samsung strike enters fifth day

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The protests cast shadow on Indian PM Modi's manufacturing

goals

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Group plans unions at electronics firms Flex and Sanmina ( SANM )

By Munsif Vengattil and Praveen Paramasivam

CHENNAI, Sept 13 (Reuters) - A labour strike in India

that has disrupted production at a Samsung plant has put the

spotlight on a politically-backed worker group which quietly

mobilized employees of the South Korean company and now plans to

extend its efforts in the country's electronics sector.

The Samsung protests over low wages, now in their fifth day,

cast a shadow on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's plan of

courting foreign investors to "Make in India" and tripling

electronics production to $500 billion in six years.

From Foxconn to Micron, companies have been lured to more

business friendly policies and cheap labour under Modi's

decade-long rule, especially as foreign manufacturing giants

look to diversify their supply chains beyond the powerhouse of

China.

On Friday, hundreds of protesting workers wearing

blue-coloured Samsung shirts continued to sit inside makeshift

tents near the home appliances plant in southern state of Tamil

Nadu, sporting red caps with the acronym CITU.

The Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) is backed by

India's most influential hard-left political party and has 6.6

million worker members. It demands worker-friendly measures,

though it has historically focused more on auto sectors and

companies like Hyundai.

While employees at companies like Samsung can unionize

on their own, partnering with groups like CITU, which was

started in 1970, is seen by some workers as a way to garner more

national support and get their voice better heard by companies.

With the Samsung strike, CITU is now planning to make

inroads into the electronics manufacturing sector which is

growing at a rapid pace but where companies "are not doing wage

revisions properly," said S Kannan, its Tamil Nadu deputy

general secretary.

"There is no opportunity for collective bargaining either,"

he added.

A strike of this scale - which impacts production - is not

common in India's electronics industry. Previous notable ones

include worker unrests at iPhone factories of suppliers Wistron

and Foxconn during 2021, where unpaid wages and a food poisoning

incident were triggers, respectively.

CITU has plans to push for more worker rights at Apple

supplier Flex and electronics firm Sanmina ( SANM ) where it has

been in talks with the management for demands including union

recognition and better wages, Kannan said.

Flex in a statement said it upholds highest global standards

for labor practices and believe in a respectful and

collaborative environment.

The prime minister's office, the federal IT ministry, the

Tamil Nadu labor ministry, and Sanmina ( SANM ) did not respond to

Reuters queries.

DIRE SITUATION

The Samsung strike is one of biggest industrial unrests to

have caused production disruptions at a foreign multinational

company. The plant alone accounts for around a third of its

annual $12 billion India revenue.

While workers protest, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin

has been on a U.S. tour since late August and held talks with

companies such as Nike ( NKE ) and Ford.

In Samsung's case, the CITU privately wrote a letter in July

- seen by Reuters - asking the its management for higher wages

for workers who it said were forced into a "dire situation".

When the company didn't agree, CITU supported workers to

start a strike this week, which is also serving as a challenge

to companies the group says pay low wages to poor workers.

Samsung workers are earning 25,000 rupees ($300) on average

per month, CITU said, and they are demanding a raise of 36,000

rupees ($430) over three years. One worker outside the plant

said he joined Samsung a decade ago and makes only 23,000 rupees

a month, which made life difficult with soaring living costs.

"Instances of strikes could be reduced if government ensures

a mechanism for multinationals to respect the labour laws

including freedom of association and collective bargaining,"

said K.R. Shyam Sundar, an economist who has written on labour

reforms in India.

In a statement on Friday, Samsung said it has initiated

discussions with its workers at the Chennai plant "to resolve

all issues at the earliest."

(Editing by Aditya Kalra and Kim Coghill)