THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The BrahMos management has blamed soaring employee expenses for the financial problems at BrahMos Aerospace Thiruvananthapuram Ltd (BATL). In a December-4 appeal to employees to withdraw their strike plan over long overdue-pay revision, Sudhir Kumar Mishra, chairman of the holding company and Indo-Russian JV BrahMos Aerospace Pvt Ltd (BAPL), attributed the trouble at BATL to ‘very high’ employee expenses.
“Our employee costs are very high and is one of the factors due to which the company’s finance is under strain. The Pay Revision Committee has also done a study of your pay scales and found that they are amongst the best in the state,” Mishra stated in his appeal. In response to the demand for a pay revision, he added, “while we would like to consider your demands, we cannot take steps that will endanger the financial security of the BATL.”
But the irony in the sorry state of affairs is this: The same management has now invited applications to the senior posts of Chief General Manager/General Manager (Operations) and Chief General Manager/General Manager (Management)! The AITUC, INTUC and CITU-backed unions were to have begun an indefinite strike on Wednesday demanding pay revision but deferred it after the management pointed out that the Regional Labour Commissioner would discuss the matter soon.
The unions accuse the management of unfairly putting the blame on employees for the soaring expenses. As it is, the officer-employee ratio is skewed as BATL is top-heavy with an MD, one GM (Operations), three AGMs, nine DGMs and several officers in senior manager/manager/deputy manager posts, they allege. The unit, formed by taking over state government-run KELTEC for `1, has over 300 staff at present, in addition to contract employees. According to the unions, the pay revision should have come into effect on January 1, 2018.
The irony of the malady
The same management has now invited applications to the senior posts of Chief General Manager/General Manager (Operations) and Chief General Manager/General Manager (Management)! The unit, has over 300 staff at present, in addition to contract employees.