HAL employees to go ahead with strike after talks fail
Bengaluru, Oct 13: The workers of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) will go on an "indefinite strike" from Monday as talks held by the management over the unions' demands including wage revision, ended in a failure.
While the HAL on Sunday said workers decided to go ahead with the "indefinite strike" despite it making "all out efforts" to avert it, an apex body of the employees unions said the management 'refused' to consider their "fair and reasonable demands".
The employees unions of the city-headquartered HAL have served notice at all locations of the Defence PSU to go on the indefinite strike from October 14 with regard to settlement of wage revision effective from January 1, 2017.
The HAL in a release said it held conciliatory talks on Saturday and Sunday in a bid to avert the strike and offered to enhance allowance under the cafeteria system and revised rate of fitment benefit at 11 per cent among others.
"Despite the management's concerted efforts towards bringing an amicable/early wage settlement, unions unfortunately have adopted a recalcitrant approach and did not accept the offer and decided to resort to indefinite strike; in spite of management's appeal not to resort to an indefinite strike and resolve the issue in a spirit of accommodation," HAL said.
It said the latest round of talks, 11th in the series of meetings held so far, were conducted keeping in view the overwhelming sentiment amongst majority of the employees for amicable and expeditious resolution of the issues and the overall interest of the organisation.
During the talks, a stock of issues settled and a few pending issues was taken up and the management also offered to enhance allowances under cafeteria system and revised rate of fitment benefit at 11 per cent, the release said.
The wage negotiation committee also apprised the unions the ill-effects of resorting to any strike jeopardising the interest of the employees and organisation and the nation at large, it added.
The All-India HAL Trade Unions' Co-ordination Committee (AIHALTUCC) said the decision to launch the strike was taken at a meeting held under the chairmanship of the Committee chief convenor Suryadevara Chandrasekhar.
The AIHALTUCC which met here "took stock of the situation arising out of the management's refusal to consider the fair and reasonable demands of the unions in regard to wage revision."
It resolved that all workmen in all the HAL divisions will be commencing their indefinite strike from Monday as decided earlier.
A resolution adopted at the meeting appealed to all workmen to fully participate in the indefinite strike and make it a "historical success," a release from AIHALTUCC, which comprises nine recognised unions, said.
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Hamas accepts cease-fire proposal for Gaza, but Israel's stance still uncertain
Jerusalem, May 6: Hamas announced Monday it has accepted an Egyptian-Qatari cease-fire proposal, but there was no immediate word from Israel, leaving it uncertain whether a deal had been sealed to bring a halt to the seven-month-long war in Gaza.
It was the first glimmer of hope that a deal might avert further bloodshed. Hours earlier, Israel ordered some 100,000 Palestinians to begin evacuating the southern Gaza town of Rafah, signalling that an attack was imminent. The United States and other key allies of Israel oppose an offensive on Rafah, where around 1.4 million Palestinians, more than half of Gaza's population, are sheltering.
An official familiar with Israeli thinking said Israeli officials were examining the proposal, but the plan approved by Hamas was not the framework Israel proposed.
An American official also said the US was still waiting to learn more about the Hamas position and whether it reflected an agreement to what had already been signed off on by Israel and international negotiators or something else. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity as a stance was still being formulated.
Details of the proposal have not been released. Touring the region last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken had pressed Hamas to take the deal, and Egyptian officials said it called for a cease-fire of multiple stages starting with a limited hostage release and some Israeli troop pullbacks from Gaza. The two sides would also negotiate a “permanent calm” that would lead to a full hostage release and greater Israeli withdrawal, they said.
