Auto Workers in India Organize for May Day here ♦ Indian Farmers: Communism Will Lead the Way here ♦
Auto workers’ struggle in Chennai, India, 2022
Auto Workers in India Organize
March on May Day to End Wage Slavery and Imperialist War with Communist Revolution
CHENNAI (India), January 29— “Many workers were appalled to see the devastation in Gaza. So many of our workers must spend long hours, sometimes more than twelve, to feed the family,” said Deepak, an auto worker, at our Red Flag collective meeting. “I can’t imagine how masses of people in Gaza without homes, food, and water, and under constant bombing can feed their families.”
Nine auto worker comrades discussed how our work is affected by the Gaza genocide. “My coworker’s family was doing construction work in Saudi Arabia,” Omar reported. “He is laid off after the disruption in Yemen. Now he is looking for work in the auto industry here.” Omar’s friend is not alone. Thousands are returning from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq.
“This is how capitalism works,” explained an ICWP comrade who distributes Red Flag to many in his neighbourhood. “The war in Gaza appears to be between Hamas and Israel. However, imperialists are involved. The US and European rulers are directly fueling the massacres in Gaza. The Iranian rulers, supported by Russian and Chinese imperialists, are fighting to eliminate the US presence in the area.
“Both sides are escalating wars, as we see in Yemen and Lebanon. It is an attack on the working class everywhere. We might not see immediately how it affects us. But look at the port in Chennai. There is a 30% reduction in shipping to the Suez Canal. They are diverting it to much longer routes, raising costs 40%. Now they are laying off port workers.”
The auto unions here are not even thinking about deadly imperialist wars. So, they cannot offer any solution to end it with communist revolution. There are 181 major automobile plants in a sixty kms corridor in Chennai. They employ over two million workers. How can we reach out to these industrial workers? This is a pressing question that comrades were trying to understand.
“We are wage slaves; we produce everything, and capitalists try to make maximum profit,” said an ICWP comrade. “They must constantly attack us to reduce our wages. They also must attack other capitalists to eliminate competition. The unions cannot resolve this contradiction because they want to keep wage slavery. They compromise with our class enemy.” This comrade had just attended a meeting of CITU, the Centre of Indian Trade Unions. It is affiliated with the Communist Party of India (Marxist).
This union meeting asked for a twelve percent pay increase. The union only represents the contract workers. Sixty percent of the workforce has no contract, and they earn less than half of what contract workers make. The non-contract workers also have no pension funds, healthcare, or housing subsidies. They are forced to live very far from the plant. Most of the noncontract workers come from other states, don’t speak the same language, and many are Dalits or Muslims.
The union settled with the owners for a seven percent pay increase for contract workers and only two percent for non-contract workers. The official inflation rate is nine percent. At this union meeting, four comrades distributed Red Flag and a leaflet. The leaflet explained that no matter how much unions fight, workers will still be wage slaves.
In communism, the working class will cease to be wage slaves. Nobody will be an autoworker all their life. Without profit and greed, the working class will only produce what is needed for society.
Under capitalism, since profit is the main drive, many useless things are produced. This creates inefficient cities choked with unwanted cars, congestion, and environmental disasters. The result is racism, sexism, and imperialist wars for more profit.
We were able to talk to many auto workers. Some know us. They were all disappointed in the union’s sell-out proposal. We engaged with them and invited them to our next meeting. Our goal is to concentrate on our close comrades, so they become active members of our party. We proposed to continue to discuss dialectics of change, and how a small party can become a mass party for communism.
The first May Day in Chennai was celebrated 101 years ago in memory of the workers’ struggle. It still inspires workers everywhere. We plan to bring to the workers in Chennai our communist vision that capitalism/imperialism are creating conditions for its own demise. The International Communist Workers’ Party will build a mass party for communist revolution.
Caption: Chennai, India. First May Day in India, 1923. “When will there be 8 hours of suffering in the factory?” “Monthly instead of daily wages for hotel workers.”
India Farmers: Back to the barricades, Communism Will Lead the Way
DELHI (India), February 12— Hundreds of thousands of farmers from over nine states have converged in Delhi. They protested in huge numbers in 2020-21 against privatization that threatens to end their livelihood.
The fascist government, learning from the past, has created an impenetrable fortress around Delhi. At the entry point to Delhi’s freeways, the police have created massive layers of security: concrete road barriers, iron barricades, barbed wire, nail beds, containers, hydra cranes, and drones armed with tear gas.
ICWP members went to Delhi’s outskirts, where we met the masses of farmers. We had Red Flag and a leaflet calling for communist revolution.
“We are going to be bought by corporates like Adani and Ambani,” said a farmer. “We will starve to death. We are here to stay no matter what happens. It is life and death for us. We have huge debts; our prices are falling. We are doomed. Our children have no jobs.”
“How do you want this agitation to end?” an ICWP member asked one of the many young people who have gathered at these massive rallies.
“We want change in these profit-hungry corporates,” was the answer. “We are ready to die for this change.”
“We need to change the system, to a system where there are no corporates, no profit, no bank,” the ICWP member replied. “This is communism. Punjab has a revolutionary history of 150 years. Young communists in Punjab led millions to end capitalism all over India and what is now Pakistan and Bangladesh. But they did not know that to end capitalism, we must abolish the wage system, not build socialism where land is distributed, and the farmers are still at the mercy of the markets.”
Our agitation is just beginning. All our ICWP members are stationed at strategic locations. We are armed with Red Flags and our leaflet calling for communist revolution. The masses are open and willing to put young people in charge of the future.
Despite all the massive preparations that the Delhi Police have made to fortify the city, the farmers have found ways to diffuse the barrage of tear gas shells. They have found sideroads and lanes to bypass massive roadblocks. They have created pathways in rivers to combat the rulers, who are finding it difficult to contain the masses.
We must put communism at the forefront of our battle.