3. Trade Unions
"Trade Union" means any combination, whether
temporary or permanent, formed primarily for the
purpose of regulating the relations between workmen
and employers or between workmen and workmen, or
between employers and employers, or for imposing
restrictive conditions on the conduct of any trade or
business
Trade unions are formed to protect and promote the
interests of their members. Their primary function is to
protect the interests of workers against discrimination
and unfair labor practices.
4. Objectives
Representation
Negotiation
Voice in decisions affecting workers
Member services
(a) Education and training
(b) Legal assistance
(c) Financial discounts
(d) Welfare benefits
5. Types of Trade Unions:
i) Craft unions:- It is an organisation of
workers employed in a particular craft &
trade or in a single craft or few occupations.
Such organisation link together those workers
who have similar skills craft training etc.
ii) Industrial unions:- Covers workers with a
variety of skills employed in a single industry
e.g. coal industry.
6. iii) Staff unions: The term staff union is
popularly used to both craft & industrial
union. It is organized the workers on the
basis of craft working in the same industry.
iv) General Unions:- It is a organization
which covers various industries & labourers
having different skills
7. Functions of Trade unions
Militant functions
(a) To achieve higher wages and better
working conditions
(b) To raise the status of workers as a part of
industry
(c) To protect labors against victimization
and injustice
8. Fraternal functions
To take up welfare measures for improving
the morale of workers
To generate self confidence among workers
To encourage sincerity and discipline among
workers
To provide opportunities for promotion and
growth
To protect women workers against
discrimination
9. Social responsibilities of trade
unions include:
Promoting and maintaining national
integration by reducing the number of
industrial disputes
Incorporating a sense of corporate social
responsibility in workers
Achieving industrial peace
10. At present there are twelve Central
Trade Union Organizations in India:
All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC)
Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS)
Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU)
Hind Mazdoor Kisan Panchayat (HMKP)
Hind Mazdoor Sabha (HMS)
Indian Federation of Free Trade Unions (IFFTU)
Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC)
National Front of Indian Trade Unions (NFITU)
National Labor Organization (NLO)
Trade Unions Co-ordination Centre (TUCC)
United Trade Union Congress (UTUC) and
United Trade Union Congress - Lenin Sarani (UTUC
- LS)
11. All-India Trade Union
Congress (AITUC)
Origin:
It was established in 1920 as result of a resolution passed by the organized workers
of Bombay and the delegates which met I a conference on 31st October, 1920.
Objectives: The basic objectives of the AITUC are:
to establish a socialist state in India;
to socialize and nationalize means of production, distribution and
exchange;
to improve the economic and social conditions of the working class;
to watch, promote, and further the interests, rights, and privileges of the
workers in all matters relating to their employment;
to secure and maintain for the workers the freedom of speech, freedom
of press, freedom of association freedom of assembly, the right to strike,
and the right to work and maintenance;
to co-ordinate the activities of the labour unions affiliated to the AITUC.
12. Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh
(BMS) Origin:
This union has been the outcome of decision taken by the Jana Sangh in
its Convention at Bhopal on 23rd July, 1954.
Objectives:
to establish the Bhartiya order of classless society in which there shall be
secured full employment;
to assist workers in organizing themselves in trade unions as medium of
service to the motherland irrespective of faiths and political affinities;
the right to strike;
The BMS is a productivity-oriented non-political trade union. Its
ideological basis is the triple formula:
nationalize the labour;
labourise the industry;
industrialise the nation;
13. Centre of Indian Trade
Unions (CITU)
This union was formed in 1970 when as a result of the rift in the
AITUC, some members of the Communist party seceded. About
the objectives of the CITU, its constitution says:
The CITU believes that the exploitation of the working class can
be ended only by socializing all means of production,
distribution and exchange and establishing a socialist state,
that is, it stands for the complete emancipation of the society
from all exploitation.
The CITU fights against all encroachments on the economic
and social rights of the workers and the enlargement of their
rights and liberties including the right to strike, for winning,
defending and extending the freedom of the democratic
trade union movement.
The CITU fights against the repressive policy of the government
towards the democratic and trade union movement;
14. Indian National Trade Union
Congress (INTUC)
Origin:
The INTUC came into existence on 4th May, 1948, as a result of the resolution
passed on 17th November 1947, by the Central Board of the Hindustan
Mazdoor Sevak Sangh, which was a labour leader on the Gandhian
Philosophy of Sarvodaya.
Objectives: The aims of the INTUC are:
To establish an order of society which is free from hindrances to an all-round
development of its individual members, which fosters the growth of human
personality in all its aspects, and which goes to the utmost limit in progressively
eliminating social, political or economic exploitation and inequality, the profit
motive in the economic activity and organization of society and the anti-
social concentration of power in any form;
To place industry under national ownership and control in a suitable form;
To secure increasing association of workers in the administration of industry
and their full participation in that control;
15. National Front of Indian Trade
Unions (NFITU)
Origin
This union was founded in 1967, with the claim that “this trade union of India is
not controlled by any of the political party, employers or government.”
Objectives:
to organize and unite trade unions with the object of building up a National
Central Organisation of trade unions, independent of political parties,
employers and the government, to further the cause of labour and that of
national solidarity security and defence of India, and to make the working
people conscious of their right as well as of obligations in all spheres of life;
to secure to members of trade unions full facilities of recognition and effective
representation of interests of workers and to ensure for the working people fair
conditions of life and service and progressively to raise their social, economic
and cultural state and conditions;
to help in every possible way member trade unions in their fight to raise real
wages of the workers;
16. United Trade Union Congress
(UTUC)
Origin:
Some trade union leaders of the socialist bent met together December 1948 to
form a new central organization of labour, called Hind Mazdoor Sabha.
Objectives:
The objectives of the UTUC are:
to establish a socialist society in India;
to establish a workers’ and peasants’ state in India;
to nationalize and socialize the means of production, distribution and exchange;
to safeguard and promote the interests, rights, and privileges to the workers in all
matters, social, cultural, economic and political;
to bring about unity in the trade union movement.
