Silvester D’ Souza

Daijiworld Media Network – Kundapur (EP)

Kundapur, Nov 15: “The anti-labour policies of the government in between the Covid pandemic during the last three years have made the workers helpless. Repeated price rise, closure of industries, reduction of employment opportunities, discrimination in remuneration etc. have devastated the workers. Therefore, the opposition of the labour class needs to be stronger. The campaigns should be united,” said CITU national president Dr K Hemalatha.

She was speaking after inaugurating the 15th CITU state level conference at Kundapur’s R N Shetty auditorium.

“Political parties, who support the capitalist system, are trying to create a divide between religions in order to suppress the campaigns of unity. Religion based politics is creating cracks in the society through RSS. The economic policies and the media that are in favour of capitalists are hiding the truth. Therefore organizations such as CITU should expose the truth to ordinary people,” she said.

“The campaign that we need ration and not bhashan (speeches) during Covid pandemic received wide support. The anti-labour policies which are approved keeping the opposition parties in suspension and the anti-farmer policies are posing problems to ordinary people. Though the anti-farmer policies were withdrawn after protests by farmers for several years, the demands of workers are not implemented,” she said.

“An all India conference will be held in January, 2023 for the workers. The state level conferences are being held prior to it. The implementation of the decisions will be urged during the national level conference. Discussions on the conditions of workers on national and international level, challenges and implementations will be held during the national conference,” she said.

CITU state president S Varalaxmi presided. Former MP, CITU national chief secretary Tapan Sen, CITU national vice president A K Padmanabhan, national leader K N Umesh, senior labour leader V J K Nair, state chief secretary Meenakshi Sundaram, farmer’s organization zone vice president Basavaraja, CITU 15th national conference welcome committee honorary president K Shanker, treasurer N Narasimha and others were present.

The poster of the competition on mini film planned as part of the national conference was released. CITU state secretary Pratapsimha translated the inaugural speech to Kannada.

Balakrishna Shetty welcomed the gathering. Chief secretary Suresh Kallagara compered the programme. A flag hoisting programme was held before the conference. Homage was paid to those who departed in between state 14th conference and 15th conference.