Workers end strike at Royal Enfield Tamil Nadu plant; work resumes tomorrow

Due to the strike, the company faced a production loss of 25,000 units during Sept and Oct

Workers of two-wheeler major Royal Enfield's manufacturing facility in Oragadam, near Chennai, have called off their strike, which has been going on for 50 days. The strike was called off following a discussion held before the district administration.

The employees will join production work from Tuesday's morning shift, said their union's leader.   

The Royal Enfield Employees Union (REEU), which is not recognised by the management, claims that it has a strength of around 740 workers. Almost 600 of these union members were conducting a strike at the Oragadam facility, demanding that the management reinstate around 120 probationary employees and one permanent employee to their jobs and pay the bonus that was pending from 2015. The company had been operating the facility with temporary workers and the remaining permanent workers, said the union.    

On October 31, the company informed the stock exchanges that due to the strike, the loss in production for the months of September and October was 25,000 motorcycles.  

"We had a meeting today with the district collector and the management has agreed to some of our demands. We have agreed to join back from tomorrow morning," said R Sampath, vice-president of REEU. Earlier, the management had asked the protesting employees to join work after submitting an undertaking that they would not engage in a strike later. 

With the talks today, the workers would be able to get back to work by submitting a request to activate the punching machine for them, he added. There has not been any decision on the suspension of the trainees, while around 400 probationary employees would be working on Tuesday. The management has already issued the bonus to the workers who were not striking.

Chief operating officer of the company's Oragadam factory, B Govindarajan, in a November 1 letter to workers, said, "The strike situation prevailing since September 24 and it has been unfortunate and very disturbing to me where some our colleagues chose to abstain from work (sic)."