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Workers go on rampage in a IPhone factory in Karnataka


coffee_rules

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10 hours ago, Vilander said:

there should be more to it.. not sure if it will come out. There must be middlemen.

 

these companies wont deal with their employees in a straight forward manner ..

 

if they want to fire the employees , they will force them to exit instead of firing them by creating a difficult working conditions ..

and if they want to reduce the salary or want to cut the variable pay  , they will find fault with the employees and then they will reduce it.. 

 

trust me in this .. i was with samsung software operations and the way Koreans manage their employees i cant imagine how they handle labour intensive industries ..

samsung wanted me to quit by myself during 2011 slowdown  , but they wasted 5/6 years in forcing me quit .. :bandit: 

i was with netapp earlier , HR called our team and fired ( most of ) our team members explaining us that our project is not needed .. i was sort of junior guy in the team and i myself got 5/6 month take home as severance pay ( went home happily and then joined samsung :lol: )

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Taiwanese manufacturer Wistron said it is removing the vice president who oversees its India activities following violence at its Kolar unit in Karnataka, CNBC-TV18 reported.

Vincent Lee is vice president of Wistron in India. The plant manufactures Apple iPhones. The decision comes a week after violence erupted at the iPhone manufacturers’ Kolar plant.

 

 

https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/wistron-plant-violence-apple-iphone-maker-to-remove-its-india-vice-president-6246671.html

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Someone at VP or president level has been sacked. The organization has accepted delay in payment and will hold internal enquiry. Apple will oversee that  the third party will pay the employees on time and there is no violation of human rights. 3 contracting companies are u der scanner for their onboarding and other employee related processes.

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6 hours ago, Trichromatic said:

And? 

 

What's the solution for problem workers were facing? 

 

All workers paid as promised 16k/month. Vandals have been arrested, VP of India head of Wistron fired and Apple has put Wistron on probation. Only thing the vandals achieved by the anarchical destruction is to impact Wistron's plans to emply 25000 people by end of 2021. Objective accomplished. 

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3 hours ago, coffee_rules said:

 

All workers paid as promised 16k/month. Vandals have been arrested, VP of India head of Wistron fired and Apple has put Wistron on probation. Only thing the vandals achieved by the anarchical destruction is to impact Wistron's plans to emply 25000 people by end of 2021. Objective accomplished. 

 

So you're saying that workers were going to be paid anyway? 

 

Company accepted mistake, fired VP and took strong measures, this didn't happen because of the incident. 

 

Probably company was just waiting for Christmas and fine day to pay workers and foolish workers did all for nothing. 

 

What would have happened without this incident? 

 

Vandals committed a crime and will be punished for that, but I don't see a single critique of SFI posting what was the solution that workers could have tried. 

 

And almost none of them criticised the company. They are disappointed that why didn't workers remain quiet to exploitation and let this matter go for sake of Indian economic development. 

 

Goondas and vandals got opportunity in this case because there were bloodsuckers at other end. 

 

By not speaking against company are we secretly supporting this type of working culture of exploitation of labor. 

 

I guess people would be ok, if a village is forced to do slavery also if that gives economic development. 

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So far it seems that Karnataka govt hasn't been active against company and vandals both after the incident. 

 

I could be overestimating govt role, but Yediyurappa govt has played balanced role. Shows he is good CM. 

 

Next they should try to find how this was allowed to happen. 

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36 minutes ago, Trichromatic said:

 

So you're saying that workers were going to be paid anyway? 

 

Company accepted mistake, fired VP and took strong measures, this didn't happen because of the incident. 

 

Probably company was just waiting for Christmas and fine day to pay workers and foolish workers did all for nothing. 

 

What would have happened without this incident? 

 

Vandals committed a crime and will be punished for that, but I don't see a single critique of SFI posting what was the solution that workers could have tried. 

 

And almost none of them criticised the company. They are disappointed that why didn't workers remain quiet to exploitation and let this matter go for sake of Indian economic development. 

 

Goondas and vandals got opportunity in this case because there were bloodsuckers at other end. 

 

By not speaking against company are we secretly supporting this type of working culture of exploitation of labor. 

 

I guess people would be ok, if a village is forced to do slavery also if that gives economic development. 

 

Sept 27, 1966 - "Riots are self-defeating and socially disruptive."  "Riot is the language of the unheard." 

 

Listen to this man talk - he does a beautiful job of condemning rioting, while at the same time explaining why people do it.   Often, if we listened to people when they have legitimate concerns and address them in a timely manner, they will not go into riot mode.  Sometimes the strategy may not work, but more often than not, it does.  

 

 

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1 hour ago, Tibarn said:

That is what hiring a lawyer and going to court is for. 

 

 

Which villager will hire a lawyer and go to court against big corporation for 16k rupees? 

 

In current method, not only their issues were addressed immediately, but company apologized and taking steps to fix it also. It happened within a week. 

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8 minutes ago, Trichromatic said:

 

Which villager will hire a lawyer and go to court against big corporation for 16k rupees? 

 

In current method, not only their issues were addressed immediately, but company apologized and taking steps to fix it also. It happened within a week. 


Really, this is extortion. The HR guy says they were all paid , whom do you believe? The guys breaking in and stealing iPhones? Their cred is lost . Since this incident has international impact, the actions are taken quickly. The current solution will be detrimental to the nation and set a precedent to resolve future disputes 

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3 hours ago, BacktoCricaddict said:

 

Sept 27, 1966 - "Riots are self-defeating and socially disruptive."  "Riot is the language of the unheard." 

 

Listen to this man talk - he does a beautiful job of condemning rioting, while at the same time explaining why people do it.   Often, if we listened to people when they have legitimate concerns and address them in a timely manner, they will not go into riot mode.  Sometimes the strategy may not work, but more often than not, it does.  

 

 

 

 

Organizations like SFI won't have a role here, if multiple authorities had taken action at right time.

 

1. Company failed to pay workers.

2. Management was allowed to run company in such manner.

3. Is there a system of inspection from the govt? If yes, then govt also allowed them to run free hand.

4. Was management accessible to workers? What options did they have to escalate the issue?

 

Normally you would expect employees to escalate the matter to multiple levels and that solves the problem. Why wasn't it happening? It has been 3 months. Either management wasn't accessible or management chose to ignore it. Either way it was dangerous and needed an fix.

 

If that didn't work, then as next step, govt authorities needed to step in. Not sure what's the process was in this case. This needs to be investigated.

 

If govt and management didn't pay attention, next step would be to fight a court case.

 

How can an ordinary villager hire a lawyer and go to court against big corportation for such amount? One way would be to organize all such employees and take legal route collectively.

 

Won't it become a union then? Person who actually guides them will be then again seen as roadblock to economic development. What will happen to all these workers while they fight a court case? How long will case go on? 5 years, 10 years? What's the cost of fighting such cases and what will be the return? Most importantly how will they form such unions?

 

One of the member in suggested why can't they go for strike? Then again it will need union and it will be SFI like organization who will seen as anti-development group. Again how long will it take? 

 

These guys took the crime route, got easy solution - within a week. This is fastest they might have seen a matter being solved at factory. 

 

What's the message being sent here? Management is untouchable if you're exploited. But you vandalize property and we will give quick fix. Shame that it comes out that way.

 

 

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14 minutes ago, coffee_rules said:


Really, this is extortion. The HR guy says they were all paid , whom do you believe? The guys breaking in and stealing iPhones? Their cred is lost . Since this incident has international impact, the actions are taken quickly. The current solution will be detrimental to the nation and set a precedent to resolve future disputes 

 

I believed it as fault of vandals only earlier.

 

Whom do I believe - I believe the company which has openly accepted those mistakes.

 

Now it's a mistake from all side and issue was escalated from the company side.

 

Well paid - not sure what does that mean in this context.

 

How is asking for your salary extortion?

 

It's a shame that such precedent will be set for future dispute. Action of company has certainly been detrimental for nation.

 

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Early findings of an Apple audit in the wake of violence at the Wistron plant in India’s Karnataka state showed violations of its ‘Supplier Code of Conduct’, the Cupertino, California-based tech giant said in a statement.

 

Apple said Wistron had failed to implement proper working hour management processes, which “led to payment delays for some workers in October and November”.

 

Wistron on Saturday admitted some workers at the plant in Karnataka’s Narasapura had not been paid properly or on time, and it was removing a top executive overseeing its India business.

Apple said it will continue to monitor Wistron’s progress on corrective action.

 

“Our main objective is to make sure all the workers are treated with dignity and respect, and fully compensated promptly,” Apple said, adding that it continued to investigate issues at the plant, which is located some 50 km outside of the southern tech hub of Bengaluru and assembles one iPhone model.

 

“This is a new facility and we recognise that we made mistakes as we expanded,” Wistron said in a statement. “Some of the processes we put in place to manage labor agencies and payments need to be strengthened and upgraded.”

 

Wistron said it is re-structuring its teams and setting up 24-hour hotlines for employees to make anonymous complaints.

 

“Apple has sent a strong message to its suppliers, telling them unequivocally that they need to adhere to its standards,” Neil Shah of Hong Kong-based tech researcher Counterpoint said.

“In the long-run it should make suppliers more cautious and likely create fewer such public-relations headaches for Apple.”

 

 

@coffee_rules

 

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Wistron introduced 12-hour shifts from the earlier eight-hour shifts at the plant in October but failed to properly address "the confusion in the minds of the workers" about their new wages inclusive of overtime, the report noted.

The company also did not inform the factories department of the new work shifts, it said.

Wistron, which also changed its attendance system in October, did not fix for two months a glitch which caused employees' presence to be incorrectly registered, the probe found.

Some other violations highlighted in the report included underpayment of wages to contract workers and housekeeping staff, and making women staff work overtime without legal authorisation.

An earlier government audit of the factory, just hours after the rampage, had also found "several labour law violations", Reuters previously reported.

 

https://in.reuters.com/article/apple-india-idUSKBN28T0DW

 

https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/apple-supplier-wistron-could-not-manage-scaled-up-india-plant-govt-report-71608468449304.html

 

So company fails to scale up operations properly - management failure.

Violates labour laws - legal issues.

Underpays workers - exploitation.

 

But we want to believe that workers are lying even when everything is out in open. There are no rumors, company has already put forward their statement.

 

Like I said, I was going through social media posts and everyone is just disappointed with it being detrimental to further economic development. Everyone wants SFI to be dealt strictly, blaming workers and unions only.

 

No one wants to blame company, management failure  or lack of options workers had.

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If we rue about 25k expansion plan, we should also take a note of the fact that company failed to manage scaling upto 10k, violated laws during that and left lot of gaps in order to expand. 

 

We are ok if we company breaks laws and exploit people as long as it's expanding.

 

But if workers break laws, they become extortionists. 

 

There has to be a middle ground in this.

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1 hour ago, Trichromatic said:

Which villager will hire a lawyer and go to court against big corporation for 16k rupees? 

Except it isn't a single "villager."  The vandalism was done by a group of an estimated 7000. Instead of vandalism, they could have filed a lawsuit, after all, multiple parties can be part of a single lawsuit. They would win the case and could also sue for lawyer fees, et al. 

 

If it is really such small amount, in your eyes, then should they indulge in large scale violence? Over 100 got arrested up until now, and anyone who is caught having been involved in the violence will likely lose their jobs. These are mostly contract labourers, they aren't exactly irreplaceable by the company. Would losing one's job be a "success?"

 

If your argument is that it would take a long time to win this case, then that is a different issue. This is a case of a failure of contract enforcement. That is one area that even foreign investors have highlighted as an area in which India needs to drastically improve. I would agree with that criticism, but that is, again, a separate issue. The solution isn't necessarily ideal, but it is the best one. 

 

Furthermore, you are ignoring the other side, the side of the company. Losing Rs 26-52 crore isn't some joke. Those costs will have to be recuperated from somewhere. The cost will either be passed onto the consumer, the state government will have to compensate(at the Karnataka taxpayer's expense), or the company will cut costs to balance its budget. Is it still a "success" if the factory downsizes to say half the number of contract-labourers?  

 

If you think their thuggery was successful, I won't completely disagree, they got what they wanted( in the short-term), but it will cost them/others later.

 

 

 

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