Thiruvananthapuram: The agitation among plantation workers in Kerala appears set to aggravate, with cardamom plantation workers, too, being drawn into the demand for higher wages.
The weeks-long agitation by thousands of tea plantations workers in Munnar has shown no sign of an early end, and the cardamom plantation workers have also put forward a demand for higher pay.
While thousands of workers in Munnar’s Kanan Devan Hills Plantation (KDHP) company are demanding that they be given a daily wage of Rs500 (Dh28.2), as against the existing daily remuneration of Rs232, the workers at cardamom plantations are demanding a hike of Rs 100 per day from the existing daily wage of Rs270.
No ground has been broken in the parleys between the trade unions, the plantation owners and government representatives with regard to the minimum daily wage despite several rounds of discussions.
In the case of Munnar, the issue is more complicated, given that hundreds of women workers who have lost faith in traditional trade unions have grouped themselves under an organisation named Pembilai Orumai (Women’s Unity) and are agitating by themselves. Traditional trade unions are also holding their own protest for a wage hike.
This has made it tougher for the state government and the plantation owners in arriving at an agreeable wage settlement with the workers. The next meeting to discuss the issue of the tea plantation workers is scheduled for Tuesday.
The agitation has hit most of the plantation sector in Kerala. Plantation owners say that the commodity price meltdown has made it impossible to think of a wage rise for employees.
For the state government, the workers’ agitation for higher wages is a bothersome issue in the context of the approaching civic body elections.
While the plantation sector has reeled under the wave of agitations, the tourism sector in Munnar has also been hardly hit because workers are resorting to road blockades at all arterial points in Munnar.
