Trade Unions must go beyond labour issues: top woman TU leader

The first woman to head an Indian central trade union started young.
Amarjeet Kaur was a teenager studying in a Delhi school when she organised a strike to get an examination schedule changed. The strategy worked.
That was in 1969.
Today, Kaur is the national general secretary of the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC), and still recalls the strength that the young can wield.
"Trade Unions cannot limit themselves to only labour issues. The time has come for them to build bridges with other sections of society. We have to address young Indians who are job seekers. They are the workers of tomorrow," she said.

Kaur, whose father fought for India's independence, was introduced to issues of national concern as a child.

"That was when I realised the strength of mass movements for getting justice," she told PTI.
Recently elected to the top post in AITUC, affiliated to the CPI, Kaur said she was inspired by her father to take up and fight for issues.
"I was always in the company of my father's friends among whom were trade unionists and freedom fighters. I used to go with them to the coffee house and TU offices," she recalled.
Kaur, 65, started her political journey as a student activist in Delhi University's Ramjas College, where she was elected as a union leader despite strong opposition from several quarters.

"Those days, girls were not encouraged to enter student politics," she said.
Her interest in TU activities prompted her to merge labour issues with the students' movement. She would often organise students' protests to back agitating workers of textile mills near the Delhi University campus.
Though she was not a member of any political party then, Kaur moved towards the CPI after she was jailed in 1972.
"A call was given by the the Communist Party of India for a protest against rising prices. I had organised a students' protest. The Police arrested me and I was put in Tihar jail for ten days," she said.

Soon after she was released, the CPI asked her to join the party, she added.
She did, and was given the responsibility of its students' wing, the All India Students Federation (AISF).
Kaur went on to become the first woman all-India general secretary of the AISF in 1979.
Always interested in gender issues, she also worked for the CPI's women's group.
But the political journey was not an easy one. Kaur was strongly criticised by many who believed it was not a woman's role to take part in politics.
After she was married, her relatives tried to pressure her to give up political activism. But Kaur carried on.

Later, when she joined AITUC as a labour leader in 1994, she focussed on issues related to women and child labour.
Kaur felt that being a woman TU leader helped her understand problems of women at work and home.
"Trade Union doesn't deal with domestic violence, but if a trade union leader is a woman, then you can understand women's problems," she said, adding that it helped that she was aware of both women's issues and labour laws.
"I had this additional advantage that gave me additional strength," Kaur explained.
Today she feels that the time has come for trade unions to go beyond their labour agenda.

"We have to reach out to the youth who are unemployed. Otherwise, they will be used by communal forces," she said.