Protesting Asian Paints workers detained

Over 60 striking workers of Asian Paints Ltd's plant near here were detained by police on Thursday when they protested outside the labour commissioner's office, said a top union official.

"The workers are on strike since April 28 demanding reinstatement of dismissed workers; payment of bonus/ex-gratia and starting wage revision talks and action against the official who assaulted another employee," V. Rajesh, president of the Asian Paints Employees Union told IANS.

"Since there was no progress in the talks held at the labour commissioner's office in Sriperumpudur we decided to come here and have talks with the senior officials in the labour commissioner's office here," Rajesh added.

According to him, the response of officials were not encouraging and the solutions they offered would not resolve the dispute in a short time but would go to the courts where it would take several years. Hence, the workers decided to hold protest.

"We want to meet the chief minister and put forth our problems to her," Rajesh said.

He said Asian Paints Sriperumbudur factory has around 450 workers (200 permanent and 250 contract workers).

All the permanent workers are on strike and the factory is being run with contract workers.

According to a worker, the plant can make 450,000 litres of paint per day and the production must have come down by more than half.

Workers have been protesting since April as the management had dismissed two permanent workers, suspended two and dismissed over 60 contract workers.

A mail sent to Asian Paints by IANS remained unacknowledged.