No progress on breaking the Toyota impasse

The management-employees standoff over lockout at Toyota Kirloskar Motor's two plants at Bidadi near here is persisting as renewed talks between them failed to reach any consensus today.
"Deliberations are still on. We have called a meeting again on Tuesday. Hopefully, we may reach some settlement that day," Additional Labour Commissioner J T Jinkalappa told PTI.
In response to a question, he said: "Suspension of 30 workers is the sticking issue. I'm hopeful that we will be able to reach some consensus on it."
Toyota Kirloskar Employees Union Joint Secretary N Raghu said: "Meeting could not reach any conclusion even today; officials have called for a meeting again on Tuesday."

"Management seems to be adamant on suspension of 30 employees. We are also very firm on our demand that suspension should we withdrawn. On undertaking issue, there seems to be some flexibility," he added.
Raghu also said that relay hunger strike by union members are still on.

On Thursday, the Labour department had renewed talks in an attempt to bring both the parties to a dialogue table to end the stalemate.
Toyota Kirloskar Motor, the subsidiary of Toyota Motor Corp of Japan, had on March 16 declared a lockout, following the failure of talks between the management and the union over wage negotiations.

The union is demanding a wage hike of Rs 4,000 as against Rs 3,050 proposed by the management.
On March 24, the lockout was lifted, with employees not resuming work as they objected to signing a good conduct undertaking as demanded by the company and pressing for withdrawal of the suspension orders.