Workers at Honda India in New Delhi have fought police for a second day in a row. They started demonstrating in support of sacked colleagues; the police attempted to intimidate them, the workers responded and a full-scale police assault ensued. Up to 700 people have been injured so far. But the demonstrations have continued, and solidarity demonstrations have started spreading. An inquiry into police actions has been launched.

Honda India has 'distanced' itself from the violence, claiming
"the violence had taken place outside the factory." Never mind that the violence started because of what took place inside the factory. Once again we see the capitalist lie that politics and economics are separate; in fact, politics is about maintaining economic order. Which includes police attacking strikers.

I am full of pride for my fellow workers today. Those brave men & women withstood police attack. And they didn't trouble themselves about being 'violent'. No middle class liberal moralism here - someone hit them, they hit back.

Cops on the rampage...

I suppose human resource consultants would see this incident as a 'failure', an inability to communicate properly between workers & management. Actually, it's a resounding success. The contradictions between what workers want, and what management wants, aren't just words - they're real differences of interest. In this case, the company failed to comply with labour laws, and fired workers who were pressing wage demands. Those are class differences. This battle means that workers understand those differences and, more importantly, are ready to act on them.

I hope those workers continue beating back the police and feel their own power. I hope Honda is scared enough to grant their demands. And I hope this sets a precedent: that other workers see it's possible to fight & win.

Reading between the lines

That media outside India has reported this at all speaks to how important this event is. However, as usual, the media has swallowed the capitalist line, in two ways:

#1) Outside agitators

The Guardian blames Communists:

Honda claimed many of the rioters were not their workers, implying outsiders had whipped up emotions... The Communist Party of India, which lends crucial support to Mrs Gandhi's coalition, has become increasingly vocal about the present administration's "neo-liberal" policies.

Communists were obviously involved - check the red flags in the photo. However, Communists didn't sack or beat workers - Honda & the police did. Communists didn't impose neo-liberal policies (why the quotes? Even the neo-liberals use the term.) The Indian government did. How is any of that the Communists' fault? If the ruling class - the government, capitalists and police - are going to impose austerity and beat people up when they resist, they can expect organized resistance.

#2) Poor, innocent police

Most stories equated police & demonstrator violence. The Guardian reports: "television images showed furious women chasing police officers and pounding them with canes; other footage showed policemen beating dozens of protesting Honda workers with bamboo sticks and firing shots into the air."

Carnage, mayhem - all things to offend shocked liberal sensibilities. However, when real things like wages & jobs are at stake, schoolmaster sensibilities ("I don't care who started it!") don't wash. Particularly when those who are supposed to settle fights - the police - are being brutal monsters. Compare these two accounts, first from The Financial Express, Honda Episode Rocks House:

Hundreds of Honda workers were injured on Monday when they engaged in fisticuffs with the police outside the company’s plant. The workers were protesting against the management demanding higher wages.

... workers fighting back

Now, the Times of India, 700 workers injured in clash with Gurgaon police:

At least 75 workers were rushed to hospital and many more injured when incensed Haryana policemen went berserk and thrashed agitating workers of Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India (HMSI) here on Monday.

Trouble broke out when the workers, staging a protest march, were confronted by police in the Civil Lines area. On being held back, the workers injured a deputy superintendent of police and set fire to the SDM’s vehicle. This acted as a trigger for the police to unleash massive retaliatory violence.

The second account gives blow-by-blow detail which, not coincidentally, shows the police provoking and then attacking demonstrators.

Eyewitnesses... said the policemen were not so much interested in dispersing the mob, as to thrash the workers black and blue by ringing them in from all sides....

After beating the workers into submission — and indeed some of them senseless — the police pressed home its advantage by heaping humiliation. The workers were made to hold their ears, and crouch while running, among other things.

The article's pro-worker 'bias' is there because the journalist actually spoke to some workers. In other words, she did real research, something that's sorely lacking in most accounts of demonstrations.

Another article quotes a lawyer for arrested workers describing the action:

To beat up the people so brutally that they won't stand up again," Fernandes said describing the action as an "effort to finish off the workers agitation."

The candour is refreshing; too bad the lawyer had to be tortured for two days before someone would quote him. My heart goes out to those men & women. Fuck the state, the capitalists and the police - nothing is stronger than workers' power.