Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh to lead bank and coal sector strikes this week

The Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), the trade union affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), has announced support to the two-day strike call in the banking sector on Thursday and Friday.

The BMS is also taking part in Tuesday’s one-day strike in Coal India Limited and Singareni Collieries Company. It will launch a countrywide “mass movement” and awareness programme against disinvestment of public sector undertakings, or PSUs, from September 25 to October 2.

In the third week of August, the BMS had joined hands with other central trade unions to oppose corporatisation of the ordnance factory board.

The BMS has upped the ante against the Narendra Modi government after its national executive met in the national capital on August 16, 17 and 18.

At its national executive, the BMS passed a resolution that slammed the NITI Aayog for pushing disinvestment of public sector undertaking, or PSUs, and demanded that the government change its economic policies.

“We are not just participating in these strikes, or supporting from outside, but as the largest trade union in the country we are leading these strikes,” BMS general secretary Virjesh Upadhyay told Business Standard.

Upadhyay said the union was well aware the recent cuts in corporate tax could mean the government selling PSUs to private players to make up for the fiscal deficit. “Current economic policies offer no solution. There is a need for a paradigm change. We are totally against disinvestment of PSUs and protest erosion of workers’ rights,” Upadhyay said.

During the first five years of the Modi government, the BMS pursued a policy of restrained criticlism of the government in its public statements, and kept away from street protests. The previous term of the Modi government witnessed two nationwide general strikes – on September 2, 2015 and January 8-9, 2019. The BMS did not participate in either.

On Sunday, the BMS affiliated National Organisation of Bank Workers (NOBW) announced its support to the two-day bank strike. Four officers’ unions of the banking sector have called the strike – the All India Bank Officers’ Confederation (AIBOC), All India Bank Officers’ Association, (AIBOA), Indian National Bank Officers Congress (INBOC), and National Bank Officers’ Organization (NOBO). The NOBO is a BMS affiliate.