March Forward To Greater Glory- Our Tradition to Carry Forward
NFTE 25 years
-
O P Gupta
( Excerpts from the
Silver Jubilee Session Jaipur Report Submitted by O P Gupta Ap 1980)
NFPTE is not the starting point of the P&T Trade
unionism. It is an important landmark, when the Government , partly in its
desire to unify the trade unions with a view to yoke their effective
cooperation in implementation of 5 year
plans and partly under the compulsions created by UPTW, came forward to
rationalize TU movement, by surrendering its right to recognize new unions- a
license to disrupt the TU movement. However Govt did not honour its commitment
for long and started recognizing new unions from 1968 with the result that we
have now 68 recognised unions.
Late DadaGhosh gave life to Realignment scheme. Late K
G Bose contributed much to bring new concept and militant attitude in the
P&T movement. Comrade K.Ramamurthy’s contribution as SG UPTW and later as
GS P3 during 1960 strike are worth
recording. There were many others like Mrs Nayama Haider, K S Pitkar, PSR
Anjaneyalu who did a lot in consolidating the organization.
In the NFPTE we had not adopted a self righteous
attitude of condemning others who have left.
Our Union (AITEEU Cl3) is one of the youngest as the
Telecom services themselves have grown after independence . Before independence we were unwanted
appendix to Telegraph Unions. When UPTW started organizing the Telecom workers
after 1947, there response was extremely enthusiastic. Therefore in 1949 strike
threat, arrest and victimization were more extensive in Telecom wing. Many
ladies imprisoned.
In organizing telecom workers contributions of
comrades V S Menon,S K Pakrasi, K G Bose, Moni Bose, Majeedh, Venugopal, N K
Saran, Yusuf paisule, K N Sharma, Janak, Nambeesan cannot be ignored. Many
others like K L Shrma, B P Sharma, kapoor,Namboodri, AyyappanKutty are stll
active.
Despite multiplicity of cadres with so called
conflicting interests, varied growth of consciousness, existent of all
political views, some time making vulgar criticism beyond the accepted norms,
we have remained together. We have
firmly believed that we in the telecom or others in the other wings
cannot growat the cost of others, but only together.
Vanguards cannot fight the battle for all. They can
only lead. Final victory depends upon the performance of the army.
We have generally taken decisions by consensus as
differences amongst us are insignificant compared to the differences of our
employer. We have found compromises are necessary for consolidating our gains
and for the growth of organization. Our tactical line has beenthat of
Sivaji in contrast to Maharana
Pratap. Shivaji believed in hitting,
winning, consolidating the gains before again hitting.
Everyone in TU has the right to get protection. Being
a multi cadre union we cannot ignore the interests of any cadre howsoever small
it may be. Unity can be on the basis of all the cadres advancing together and not one at the cost of others.
The majority has to carry the minority along with it in its own interest so
that none stalls the advance
Expression of Views and debate is a necessary pre
requisite of democracy, but differences can be expressed and common approach
evolved without causing disruption. We have believed that neither majority
should get intoxicated nor minority has a veto. We have advocated for broad based election of office
bearers to ensure that opposition is not kept away and allowed to disrupt from
outside.
We have struggled hard to evolve a common approach. We
have not agreed to eliminate persons on the basis of political social or
personal views. We have abrogated our right of imposition of persons from the
top to replace others who differ with the leadership. The only method to protect
the democracy is to compel the workers to resolve their differences mutually.
After all, it is they who have to live together. We feel justifiably proud that
NFPTE has all groups within it.
Our approach to the government as our employer has
been constructive. Neither we support them blindly, nor we oppose them
permanently. We decide our position on issue to issue. Our federation has
always taken a reasonable and rational approach in the settlement of demands.
It has firmly believed that improvement of services and betterment of workers
are inseparable. Efficiency of services and cordial employee- employer
relationship at the lower level can be maintained only if irritants are
resolved
During this 25
years of existence of NFPTE, our union has played a leading role as catalytic
agent. Our emphasis on Good will in the matter of staff relations was ridiculed
as applying Muska. Muska from a position of strength does not
mean surrender but avoids show of muscles.
Efficiency in our services has been deteriorating
mainly because of the standard of equipments on the one hand and the department
protecting and favouring corrupt persons on the other hand demoralized the
employees. The economic difficulty makes many to surrender to temptations. This
pattern has to change. Nevertheless workers have to play a role and let us do
our best in this direction.
Comrades, we are closing 25 years of fruitful
existence with bright prospects in the years ahead. We are strong enough to
succeed and thus march forward taking all others along with us towards greater
glory.
Comrades, improvement of workers a lot does not depend
on one man or even on leadership. We can guide the movement but
cannot become the movement
The saga and Legacy of NFPTE- 60 Years
-
R Pattabiraman
The
Postal and telecom employees have been observing the diamond jubilee
celebration of our great NFPTE formed in November 24, 1954. It is our bounden
duty to retrace our driven path to make our young generation to know the
cherishable events of our history.
The
saga of P&T trade union movement has its own integral part of our freedom
movement since the beginning of 20th century. Organized movement of
Postal and telegraph workers were accelerated by our forefathers Henry Barton and Tarapada by
forming unions in Telegraph, postal and
RMS. The trials and tribulations, struggles and sacrifices are classics to the
core and stand as our own epics. The call of Tarapada to organize yourself with
a purpose, with determination and find your power still inspires us all.
Workers are not beggars, they have right to choose reverberates even today.
The
postmen struggle of 1946 led by senior leader V G Dalvi and DadaGhosh is viewed not for any sectional
demands alone but a struggle to expedite
the achievement of freedom. The need of carrying forward the tradition
of Tarapada of AIPRMS by installing new leadership was felt by DadaGhosh and
others and that fulfilled the advent of
young and energetic visionary Op
Gupta to our movement. Then AITUC
leaders Com BT Ranadive and Dange helped in this regard.
The efforts of young O P Gupta with the help
of DadaGhosh , K Ramamurthi and others
to establish a single union from
the bush of multiple unions was
accepted thro a merger resolution
and the attempt of unifying the movement was greatly achieved by
formation of UPTW just two days before independence on Aug 13, 1947. The post
men union was left out. The budding independent sudeshi govt led by Nehru faced
partition problems, communal tension and Gandhi’s assassination etc. The
communists were in the mood of their assessment that it was possible to
overthrow the new government with general strikes.
The
pay commission and DA issues made UPTW to issue strike notice, first ever by O
p gupta . The leaders were arrested.
Gupta was detained for 14 months
and even habeas corpus was not allowed. Leaders like K G Bose and
JanakGupta were dismissed. Com
K.Ramamurthi became SG of UPTW when Gupta was in jail. The need of realignment
of Unions with federal setup was felt by both the leadership and GOI. Shri
JagajivanRam and Rafi kidwai initiated the scheme and the formation of NFPTE on
Novemebr 24, 1954 thus became a historic occasion. It was a federal setup of 9
unions of postal, RMS, Telegraph, Telecom and Administration wings with a
compulsory federation. Comrades Dalvi and Dadaghosh became the first president
and secretary General.
Besides the important issues of all walks of
employees, the issue of Wiping out discrimination of Class 4 and 3, issues of
casual labour and ED were all takenup by NFPTE. On the issues of second pay
commission strike notice was served against Nehru Government. There was a
glorious strike of 5 days of all CG employees
during july 1960. The SG of NFPTE com P S R Anjeneyalu was handcuffed
with chains and many leaders got arrested.
Employees shot dead on firing. Thousands of employees were terminated,
suspended, arrested. ESMA was launched to threaten the strikers. The repression
was let loose and was in great order. Recognition of NFPTE was withdrawn. Com O
P Gupta with his own inimitable style undergone indefinite fast with E X Joseph
to restore recognition. Com D Gnanaiah’s arrival at the NFPTE Hqrs added momentum and he played a prime role in the formation of
whitley council type JCM. The conditionality of abjuring Strikes for accepting
JCM was rejected forthright by the leadership.
The powerful one day strike of Sep19, 1968 of all CG employees on the
issue of need based Minimum wage and compulsory arbitration of JCM issue was
also faced worst oppression and severe attacks from Government. The next generation leaders like Jagan
emerged as heroes of the strike and got dismissal orders. The strike was led in
P&T by SG com Gnanaiah. Ninty
thousand employees were suspended and thousands were terminated and got
arrested. The recognition of NFPTE was withdrawn. Com Gupta and Gnanaiah both
had gone on indefinite fast fighting topless- bottomless recognition that is no
federation and no grass root districts and branches. The recognition was
restored but govt made efforts to dismantle NFPTE by forming FNPTO under the
leadership of Com Ramamurthy.
The
split in communist party also made its adverse impact on NFPTE. Constant tussle
and difference of opinions were becoming the part of NFPTE life during the time
of 1974 Railway strike and Emergency of Indra Gandhi period. NFPTE was severly
attacked during the emergency and its main Organs like P&T labour, weekly
correspondence, telecom were not dispatched from the post office. Intervention
of shri sanjay Gandhi was also there.
Comrade Jagan boldly took the
risk of dispatching the journals thro
Tamilnadu Organ Olikkathir and made
history . The legal battle of com Gupta helped us to restore publishing our journals again . The impact of emergency made us all to reunite
in NFPTE and at Bangalore federal council during 1978 Gupta became the
Secretary General of NFPTE.
The
strike notice issued for bonus by Gupta and Ramamurthy after the
announcement of the same for railways
during CharanSingh period roused the workers and the issue was settled and com
Gnanaiah signed the agreement of bonus. The trade union leader and tough
Minister Stephen was cautioned by Gupta
in the presence of thousands of workers
to give confidence to all that the silver jubilee celebration would coin
prime demands like Two promotions and
achieve the same. The Telecom wing gave shramdhan to postal comrades for
achieving promotion to lakhs of senior employees who were all suffered more
than 20 years without any single promotion on a single day on the issuance of
order.
The
P&T department was bifurcated in 1985 and
it led the formation of NFTE- NFPE two federations. The conference held
at Calcutta in 1986 resolved to keep NFPTE also because of emotional attachment
of many leaders from both sides..
NFTE
inherited from the great tradition of NFPTE the following qualities- toleration
of all views, fighting the cause of
needy the lower level workers, always fighting out any sort of discrimination,
never banging the doors of negotiation and preferring negotiated settlement, if
negotiation fails never fail to hit, if hitting then hitting hard, no
individual militancy- even one step with all only- things may be difficult to do but
nothing is impossible attitude- unity at any cost even at the cost
of oneself- no self patting or ego or
eulogizing, no political overtones etc.
The
great struggles of Gupta- Chandrasekar- Jagan made the historic achievement of
regularization lakhs of casual labours,
thousands of RTPs during 1986-87. The 20 days strike at the time of falling of
V P singh government on the issue of
MTNL Rs 100 and continuous consistent struggles settled the wonderful Cadre
restructuring and BCR issue in 1990 which found the new technology oriented cadres
like TTA, TM and SrTOA. The outsourcing move was stalled by 1995 strike and the
left out thousands of mazdoors got work throughout the years. Unfortunately due to internal differences
during the last years of 90s led to the formation of BSNLEU under the
leadership of Com Namboodri.
NFTE
boldly faced the challenge thrown upon by Vajpayee Govt- formation of corporate
company BSNL. The 3 days united strike of NFTE, FNTO and BTEF secured us
Government Pension by Government. The challenges are galore before us. The
secured pension should be safeguarded. We should fight for the financial
viability and revival of our company BSNL. The present leadership would strive
its best to follow the footsteps of our great tradition.
The
longings for united movement have its own sense. Let us give our ears to the
call of the time and forward with the goals and ambition of our great leaders.
OUR HERITAGE
The Great Citadel of Transformative Years
R Pattabiraman
The
saga of P&T trade union movement has its own integral part of our freedom
movement since the beginning of 20th century. Organized movement of
Postal and telegraph workers were accelerated by our forefathers Henry Barton and Tarapada by
forming unions in Telegraph, postal and
RMS. The trials and tribulations, struggles and sacrifices are classics to the
core and stand as our own epics. The call of Tarapada to organize yourself with
a purpose, with determination and find your power still inspires us all.
Workers are not beggars, they have right to choose reverberates even today.
The
postmen struggle of 1946 led by senior leader V G Dalvi and DadaGhosh is viewed not for any sectional
demands alone but a struggle to expedite
the achievement of freedom. The need of carrying forward the tradition
of Tarapada of AIPRMS by installing new leadership was felt by DadaGhosh and
others and that fulfilled the advent of
young and energetic visionary Op
Gupta to our movement. Then AITUC
leaders Com BT Ranadive and Dange helped in this regard.
The efforts of young O P Gupta with the help
of DadaGhosh , K Ramamurthi and others
to establish a single union from
the bush of multiple unions was
accepted thro a merger resolution
and the attempt of unifying the movement was greatly achieved by
formation of UPTW just two days before independence on Aug 13, 1947. The post
men union was left out. The budding independent sudeshi govt led by Nehru faced
partition problems, communal tension and Gandhi’s assassination etc. The
communists were in the mood of their assessment that it was possible to
overthrow the new government with general strikes.
The pay commission and DA issues made
UPTW to issue strike notice, first ever by O p gupta . The leaders were
arrested. Gupta was detained for 14 months and even habeas corpus was not
allowed. Leaders like K G Bose and JanakGupta
were dismissed. Com K.Ramamurthi became SG of UPTW when Gupta was in
jail. The need of realignment of Unions with federal setup was felt by both the
leadership and GOI.
Shri
JagajivanRam and Rafi kidwai initiated the scheme and the formation of NFPTE on
Novemebr 24, 1954 thus became a historic occasion. It was a federal setup of 9
unions of postal, RMS, Telegraph, Telecom and Administration wings with a
compulsory federation. Comrades Dalvi and Dadaghosh became the first president
and secretary General.
This was how Our great father figure O.P.Gupta narrated that event
in silver jublie session at Jaipur.
“ NFPTE is not the starting point of the p&T tradeunionism.It is an
important landmark when the govt partly in its desire to unify the unions
and partly under the compulsions
created by UPTW. ..Late DadaGhosh gave life to realignment scheme and K. G.
Bose contributed much to bring new concept and militant attitude in the
movement. Com K.Ramamurthy’s contribution
as SG UPTW and during 1960 strike worth recording…In the NFPTE we had
not adopted a self righteous attitude of conducting others who have left ..
Despite multiplicity of cadres, varied growth of consciousness, existence of
all political viewssome time making vulgar criticism beyond the accepted norms,
we have remained together. Vanguards cannot fight the battle for all. They can
only lead. Final victory depends upon the performance of the army. W e have
taken decisions by consesnsus as differences amongst us are insignificant
comparing our differences with our employer. We have found compromises are
necessary for consolidating our gains and for the growth of our organization”
Besides
the important issues of all walks of employees, the issue of Wiping out
discrimination of Class 4 and 3, issues of casual labour and ED were all
takenup by NFPTE. On the issues of second pay commission strike notice was
served against Nehru Government. There was a glorious strike of 5 days of all
CG employees during july 1960. The SG of
NFPTE com P S R Anjeneyalu was handcuffed with chains and many leaders got
arrested. Employees shot dead on firing.
Thousands of employees were terminated, suspended, arrested. ESMA was launched
to threaten the strikers. The repression was let loose and was in great order.
Recognition of NFPTE was withdrawn. Com O P Gupta with his own inimitable style
undergone indefinite fast with E X Joseph to restore recognition.
The
powerful one day strike of Sep19, 1968 of all CG employees on the issue of need
based Minimum wage and compulsory arbitration of JCM issue was also faced worst
oppression and severe attacks from Government.
The next generation leaders like Jagan emerged as heroes of the strike
and got dismissal orders. The strike was led in P&T by SG com
Gnanaiah. Ninty thousand employees were
suspended and thousands were terminated and got arrested. The recognition of
NFPTE was withdrawn. Com Gupta and Gnanaiah both had gone on indefinite fast
fighting topless- bottomless recognition that is no federation and no grass
root districts and branches. The recognition was restored but govt made efforts
to dismantle NFPTE by forming FNPTO under the leadership of Com Ramamurthy.
NFPTE
was severely attacked during the emergency and its main Organs like P&T
labour, weekly correspondence, telecom were not dispatched from the post
office. Intervention of shri sanjay Gandhi was also there. Comrade
Jagan boldly took the risk of dispatching the journals thro Tamilnadu Organ Olikkathir and made history The impact of emergency made us all
to reunite in NFPTE and at Bangalore federal council during 1978 Gupta became
the Secretary General of NFPTE.
The
strike notice issued for bonus by Gupta and Ramamurthy after the
announcement of the same for railways
during CharanSingh period roused the workers and the issue was settled and com
Gnanaiah signed the agreement of bonus.
The
P&T department was bifurcated in 1985 and
it led the formation of NFTE- NFPE two federations. NFTE inherited
from the great tradition of NFPTE the following qualities- toleration of all
views, fighting the cause of needy the
lower level workers, always fighting out any sort of discrimination, never
banging the doors of negotiation and preferring negotiated settlement, if
negotiation fails never fail to hit, if hitting then hitting hard, no
individual militancy- even one step with all only- things may be difficult to do but
nothing is impossible attitude- unity at any cost even at the cost
of oneself- no self patting or ego or
eulogizing, no political overtones etc
The
great struggles of Gupta- Chandrasekar- Jagan made the historic achievement of
regularization lakhs of casual labours,
thousands of RTPs. The great settlement of Time bound promotions and cadre
restructuring made lakhs of people to get their automatic promotion and
vertical higher cadre promotion. More than 3 lakhs employess benefitted in
these period. The yester day’s daily labourers
have become today’s Junior engineer by
and Telecom technicians by their hard work and opportunities
created thro the struggles conducted by the unions. The
real transformation of poor and downtrodden to the status of middle class is
happened in our Telecom movement.
NFTE
under the leadership of O P Gupta boldly faced the challenge thrown upon by
Vajpayee Govt- formation of corporate company BSNL. The 3 days united strike of
NFTE, FNTO and BTEF secured us Government Pension by Government. It was one of the greatest achievements of
any Indian trade union movement. This was unique for BSNL and no other PSU got
this kind of safeguard in social security namely pension.
The
challenges are many and we have to transcend them. The greatest task is how to conciliate our
wage settlement with the financial viability of BSNL. How to safeguard our
networks like towers and how to advance us thro new technologies to match us
with our fiercest competitors are some burning issues need some light.
Let
us imbibe our tradition of advancing the
status of workers thro toleration, struggle and some sacrifices.
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