Toyota Kirloskar making less than 100 cars a day due to strike

 Toyota Kirloskar Motor is manufacturing less than 100 vehicles a day, down from about 450, due to the ongoing dispute between the workmen and the management, the company’s deputy managing director Raju Ketkale said.

The automaker's Bidadi plants on the outskirts of Bengaluru employ about 6,500 people and have the capacity to produce more than 1,000 units of Innova, Fortuner and Camry Hybrid a day. The pandemic had reduced production; the latest imbroglio has made it worse.

“We are incurring losses. Production at the second plant is completely shut, while the first is being run on a single shift, that too with the supervisors. Most employees are not coming to work,” Ketkale told TOI, adding that the situation is not expected to affect customers and dealers.

He noted that the state government has not been supportive of the strike. "We are requesting them to take appropriate action,” he said.

Toyota Kirloskar issued a lock-down notice at the factories for the second time this month on Monday, saying it was not viable to carry on manufacturing activity with a very small number of workmen reporting to work.

The issue, Ketkale says, is workers trying to enter the factory together and beyond their designated shifts. “Post the lifting of (the previous) lock-out by TKM management, every day around 400 to 500 union members would try to barge into the company forcibly at unscheduled times...Such hostile activities of these team members have created a volatile situation around the factory premises," the company said in a statement.

The workmen have demanded reinstatement of 40 workers who have been suspended, pending enquiry, on disciplinary grounds. The management says that given the current situation, they have no option but to make all workers sign undertakings before entering the premises.

Gangadhar, a joint secretary of the TKM Employees’ Union who has also been under suspension, said the workers have raised concerns about the “extra workload” the management is imposing on them. “The turn-around time for every employee working in a line has been reduced to 2.5 minutes from 3 minutes which is not justified. Also, the management is often reducing our daily pay under the pretext that an employee was off on a loo-break.”

TKM has seen several strikes over the past years. A strike in 2014 lasted for over a month. Gaurav Gupta, principal secretary in the state commerce and industries department, said an early settlement between the parties will help send the message that it is good to do business in the state. “We need to be empathetic towards the needs of the workers and also be supportive of the industry,” he said.