THE 24th general conference of the All India Insurance Employees’ Association (AIIEA) was held in the city of Kochi which is called ‘Queen of the Arabian Sea’ from January 21-25 2017.  For the first time in the history of AIIEA, an all India conference of the organisation was held in the state of Kerala.  The conference proceedings started with a mammoth rally in which around 6000 employees participated.  The rally which started from Rajendra Maidan was flagged off by C Ravindranathan, former vice president of AIIEA.   The rally was led by “Panchavadyam” and this was followed by 24 women comrades upholding the flag of AIIEA and then by the leaders and members of the organisation representing different parts of the country. Enroute, procession was greeted by a number of fraternal trade unions.    Amidst thunderous slogans by comrades in different languages, the flag of the organisation was hoisted by Amanulla Khan, president of AIIEA. 

The inaugural session was presided over by Amanulla Khan.  P Rajeev, former member of parliament and chairman of the reception committee welcomed the gathering.  Pinarayi Vijayan, chief minister of Kerala in his inaugural address complimented the AIIEA for its contribution in protecting the lives and livelihood of the ordinary masses in the country.  While he commended the role played by AIIEA in protecting the public sector insurance, he cautioned the employees about the eagerness of the international finance capital to capture the huge asset base of the LIC and the public sector general insurance companies.  He also assured full support of his Party to the movement of insurance employees.  A K Padmanabhan, vice president of CITU addressed the meeting and said that the AIIEA and the CITU would carry forward the glorious legacy of the revolutionary spirit of the working class movement.  M Krishnan (secretary general, Confederation of Central Government Employees), P Abhimanyu (general secretary of BSNL Employees’ Union), T K Chakraborty (general secretary of All India Insurance Pensioners’ Association) greeted the conference.  With the vote of thanks proposed by V Ramesh, general secretary of AIIEA, the inaugural session came to a close.   

In the discussion on the report introduced by V Ramesh, 51 comrades, including seven women participated.  The debate was initiated by M Girija, joint secretary of AIIEA and the deliberations reflected the level of maturity and political understanding of the organisation.  The presence of two stalwarts of insurance employees’ movement viz Chandra Shekhar Bose and N M Sundaram, and their addresses enthused the participants.  Pradip Biswas, general secretary of BEFI greeted the conference.

The conference also had the opportunity of hearing Tapan Sen, general secretary of CITU.  He briefed the house about the crisis that has enveloped the capitalist world and how and why the world has not yet recovered from the crisis.  He said that because of the shifting of burdens of the crisis to the shoulders of the working class, tremendous frustration and anger is developing amongst them.  However, this frustration is being utilised by the rightwing forces.  To fight against the onslaughts that are being unleashed on the working class by the rulers of the country, he emphasised the need to reorient the strategy of the organisation and build a broader unity with the unorganised sector workers.

P Rajeev, ex-MP and chairman of reception committee clearly briefed the house on the Kerala model of development that is being implemented by the present LDF government there.  The audience were enthused to know how the state of Kerala could achieve high human development indices and attain huge progress under this government.

Apart from the regular proceedings of the conference, this time the delegates and observers of the conference had the wonderful opportunity of hearing  Ravindran Gopinath, head of the Department of History and Culture of Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi and Prof. K Satchidanandan, former secretary of Sahitya Academy and internationally acclaimed poet. They spoke on the topics “Democracy and Neo Nationalism” and “Syncretic Culture and People’s Unity” respectively.

The conference unanimously adopted 18 resolutions demanding reversal of neo-liberal policies, for communal harmony and against communalism, opposing the insensitive demonetisation policy, on empowerment of women, on empowerment of SC/ST sections, opposing amendments to labour laws, on government policy on pension, demanding strengthening of public sector insurance, demanding tax concessions to life insurance business, on the demands of unorganised sector workers, demanding recruitment in LIC, demanding merger of four public sector general insurance companies, on improvements in pension, demanding recognition to AIIEA, on collective bargaining right, restoration of democracy in West Bengal, demanding implementation of the Supreme Court Judgment on Equal Wages for Equal Work in respect of temporary employees and demanding recruitment of Class IV employees in public sector general insurance companies.

The 24th general conference of AIIEA called upon the members-

(i)           To work unceasingly for protection of public sector insurance industry;

(ii)          To launch widespread campaign against the decision of the government on disinvestment of the public sector general insurance companies;

(iii)        To hold a national level convention in New Delhi against disinvestment of PSGI companies before the end of March 2017;

(iv)         To go for a demonstration programme in LIC and General Insurance if and when the public sector general insurance companies give the Letter of Intent to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) for their disinvestment;

(v)          To go for a one day strike action in general insurance and demonstrations in LIC when the shares of the public sector general insurance companies are listed for subscription;

(vi)         To ceaselessly pursue the demand for pension option to those who could not earlier opt for the 1995 Pension Scheme both in LIC and General Insurance;

(vii)       To pursue with the LIC/ General Insurance managements for resolution of all pending issues;

(viii)     To reorient the organisation at all tiers in keeping with the challenges of the present times and keep the organisation in absolute readiness for struggle by making one to one contact with the members.

The conference unanimously elected Amanulla Khan as president, V Ramesh as general secretary and B S Ravi as treasurer for the ensuing term. The conference also elected a 168 member working committee.