India in South Asia

the public sector. But the left front government's overemphasis on maintaining industrial harmony and discouraging strike struggles and excessive dependence on the conciliation machinery have made it ineffective as an instrument of struggle. The Congress(I) government at the centre has launched an offensive against the working class and the common people. It has already passed the 59th amendment to the constitution which is a step towards introducing an emergency through the back-door, it has brought an amendment to trade union legislation for setting up a quasi-judicial body called the Industrial Relations Commission. The commission has been given wide powers to forestall strikes. The step will put severe restrictions on the freedom of action by trade unions and introduce compulsory unionisation and compulsory collection of membership dues by the management. It will also ensure recognition of unions through verification instead of secret ballot as demanded by the militant trade unions. The whole purpose of restructuring the industrial relations machinery through amendment of existing trade union laws is to bolster up stooge unions and suppress militant trade unions. The left front government and CITU and other left AT SAARC talks, the government of India has been insisting that the economies of South Asia are 'complementary' and that on the basis of this complementarity there should be a 'har- monisation' of economic plans in this region. What is meant by this harmonisa- tion is that India should be the industrial power in the region, manufacturing enough to meet the needs of the entire region, while the other countries of South Asia should concentrate on production of agricultural or other primary products. Pakistan has opposed this notion of 'complementarity', pointing out that its exports are largely competitive with those of India.