THE 15th National Conference of All India State Government Employees Federation (AISGEF) was held in Chandigarh from December 20 to December 23, 2014. CITU general secretary and MP Tapan Sen inaugurated the conference. As many as 1,226 delegates and observers from 23 states representing 26 affiliated organisations attended the conference. Of them, 212 were women. Chairman of Nepal Government Employees Organisation Punya Prasad Dhakal and Comrade Noman Nz Zaman Al Azad of Bangladesh Government Employees Coordination Council greeted the conference and handed over mementos as part of admiration and fraternity. M S Raja of Confederation of Central Government Employees and Workers, and Pradeep Biswas of BEFI addressed the opening session of the conference. Senior vice president of AISGEF Sukomal Sen presided over the session. A Sreekumar and Subash Lamba presented the General Secretary’s Report in English and in Hindi, respectively, narrating the prevailing international and national scenarios. Inaugurating the conference, CITU general secretary Sen called upon the working class for united struggle against the anti-labour policies of the NDA government, which came to power in the last parliamentary election. The present central government is following the same neo-liberal policies of the erstwhile UPA regime. The amendments to the Factories Act, Apprenticeship Act, etc., are clear indications of the anti-labour policies of the Centre. The neo-liberal policies adopted and implemented by successive governments since 1991 have ruined the living standards of the toiling masses of this country and the ear-splitting voice of the common man is seldom heard by the ruling class. The workers and employees are made to suffer due to the IMF-World Bank dictated unjust economic policies of the government. The living standards of the common people in general and the workers and employees in particular are deteriorating continuously and drastically. Skyrocketing prices of essential commodities, formidable growth of unemployment, cheap labour exploitation by employing workers and employees on contract basis and meager consolidated wages, growing attacks on trade union and democratic rights of the workers and employees, disinvestment of public sector undertakings, raising the ceiling of FDI in banking and insurance sectors and allowing FDI in pension funds and multi-brand retail trade etc., are the serious concerns of the entire working class in the country. Under the central government and various state governments, lakhs of posts are kept vacant causing unbearable workload on the existing employees and furthering the formidable growth of unemployment. Not in line with the concept of welfare state and state being a model employer, it is very unfortunate to note that the governments are resorting to employ contract workers even in perennial nature of works. This has led to the cheap labour exploitation that very low wages are paid to the contract workers which is totally against the concomitant right under Article 14 of the Constitution as it denies equal pay for those who are doing equal work with equal qualification. Despite the lapse of 67 years of Independence, a scientifically derived National Wage Policy has not been adopted yet. The norms of need-based minimum wage unanimously adopted in the 15th Indian labour Conference during 1957 are not followed in fixing the wages of the workers. Without taking the real value of money and inflationary trend into consideration, the ceiling on bonus, provident fund, gratuity, etc., are fixed anachronistically. Though India is one of the founder members of International Labour Organization (ILO), even under the British regime, the various conventions of ILO particularly conferring some inalienable rights on the workers are not ratified by the Government of India. The right to form trade unions of their own choice, the right to collective bargaining and the right to strike are not so far given statutory effect. Under the neo-liberal regime, the hard earned social securities are under serious attack. The pension under the defined benefit pension scheme is replaced by privatisation of pension fund through the obnoxious PFRDA Act. The hard earned future savings of the working class are inhumanly diverted into the speculative trade in the stock markets. Rubbing salt on the wounds, the employees are very much annoyed as FDI was allowed in pension fund also. The BJP-led government has amended the Industrial Disputes Act to the effect that the ceiling of the number of workers is raised from 100 to 300 for the applicability of the said Act. The government has also amended the Contract Workers Act, for its applicability from the present 20 to 50 workers and from the present 10 to 20 workers in the Factories Act. These entire amendments are beneficial to the MNCs and corporates and detrimental to the workers. After the BJP came to power at the Centre, the country is witnessing the acceleration of the neo-liberal policies. Besides, the civil society is being metamorphosed with Hindutva. This is the twin major agenda of the present BJP government. Hence, the trade unions should invariably pay serious attention to organise and unify the working class on class basis against any caste and communal lenience and thereby keep their gunpowder dry to protect the interests of the common people, the workers and employees, and prevent the national wealth from plundering by the corporate houses and MNCs. There was a special session on women issues on December 21 morning. CITU secretary Hemalatha inaugurated the session. The central Government is amending the labour laws in favour of MNCs. In India, so many ICDS centres have been closed. Women are working as outsourced employees in several departments. MNCs have so many special economic zones where labour laws are not applicable. In these zones women are permitted to go to toilets in stipulated times only. Exploitation of women is increasing day by day. The government’s priority is to push neo-liberal reforms. Women have no right to decide on their education, life and marriage. Here united movement is necessary for the emancipation of women, Hemlatha said. In this session, Sutapa Hazra (West Bengal) presented the discussion paper in Hindi and Thevittamani (Tamil Nadu) in English. Thirty women delegates participated in the discussion. Comrade Sabita (Haryana) summed up the discussion. The delegates adopted the Policy and Programme Resolution unanimously. The conference has given a clarion call for observing an ‘All India Demands Day’ on February 24 on a five-point charter of demands. The demands are: Withdraw the National Pension Scheme as per the PFRDA and extend the existing Defined Benefit Pension to all the employees irrespective of their date of recruitment; Fill up all the vacancies by regular appointments and countermand contractual appointment system and rescind privatisation; Regularise the services of all temporary, casual, contractual and outsourced employees; Ensure strict enforcement of labour laws and make changes in the labour laws in favour of the workers and employees; Ensure implementation of the VII Central Pay Revision with effect from January 1, 2011 and extend the benefits to all the State Government employees. The conference elected R Muthu Sundaram as chairman, Sukomal Sen as senior vice chairman, and A Sreekumar as general secretary of the federation. The conference concluded successfully with a call of unity and struggles of all the employees and workers not only against the neo-liberal policies but also to uproot the exploitative capitalist system and install in its place an egalitarian socialist system which alone will liberate the mankind from all the miseries of the capitalist exploitation.