Lockout in Maruti Suzuki:

Maruti Suzuki management having since declared a lockout in their Manesar plant following a strike with violence by their employees working there, the situation is bound to worsen further in days to come. Management’s view, as expressed by the Maruti chairman, R.C. Bhargava, is that to him ‘…what is more important is the safety of my colleagues than producing some cars to make some money’. The loss caused to the company, as the report says, is to the tune of 210 crore in terms of Indian currency with per day loss of 70 crore incurred currently after the  mishap in question. As a result of violent methods applied by the workers, the General Manager, Human Resources, A.K. Dev, had to succumb to the serious injuries caused to him. Besides the death of Dev, several executives working in the company were severely injured, some of them fighting a life and death battle in the local hospitals. Those, to whom death was caused and grievous injuries inflicted, are after all the ones who belong to this country only, excepting of course the one from Japan, and obviously every one has to feel seriously concerned with this.

It is much graver a situation warranting peremptory remedial measures in the matter, and the concerned parties involved, say Maruti Suzuki management, the workers, the government, to harness themselves in a result oriented manner working out some tangible solution without going emotional. Howsoever grave be a problem, it has to be sorted out through inter-actional  channels, and to make it possible, there is no harm in the employees accepting their responsibility for crude violence so perpetrated by them and the management relaxing their rigid postures, to create a positive ground for talks and negotiation.