Workers and left parties in South Asia mark May Day, preparing for bigger fights

The Left Chapter
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Large-scale rallies and meetings were organized by trade unions and left parties in every country in the region to commemorate the martyrs of Chicago from the 1886 strike for an eight-hour workday.

Dhaka rally to commemorate May Day

By Abdul Rahman, People's Dispatch

Hundreds of thousands of workers from all corners of South Asia took to the streets on Friday, May 1, to celebrate International Workers’ Day or May Day, renewing their commitment to confront the accelerating onslaught of attacks on workers’ rights and the intensifying cost of living crisis.

Trade unions and left parties held rallies and meetings where they paid tribute to the workers of the 1886 Chicago Haymarket affair, some of whom paid with their lives to ignite a global movement for better working conditions and the 40 hour week.

The hundreds of thousands of workers who were on the streets also resolved to continue the legacy of Chicago and advance their collective fight against the exploitative practices of capitalism to create a better and egalitarian world.

India

In India, several rallies and meetings were organized in different parts of the country, including in major cities such as Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad and states such as Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Haryana and Himachal, among others, to mark the day.

One major joint rally was held in the national capital, New Delhi, which passed through the old city and concluded at the town hall.

Speakers in most of this years’ rallies highlighted the growing labor mobilizations in mostly unorganized sectors in Noida and other parts of the National Capital Region.

The Centre for Indian Trade Unions (CITU) organized a protest meeting in Noida, in defiance of police orders, to highlight the opposition to the ongoing repression of the movement for better minimum wages in the city and to express solidarity with the striking workers.

It was noted that these movements, which often appear sporadic and spontaneous, are a result of the growing awareness among workers in the country and the need for greater organization among them.

Speakers highlighted how the introduction of the four new labor codes by the ultra-right-wing government, under Narendra Modi’s leadership, has exposed the pro-corporate nature of the government, even to sections of society which have been reluctant to acknowledge it.

This May Day, the workers resolved to sharpen their fight against these draconian labor codes and preserve the rights which were secured after centuries of struggle, beginning with the Chicago Haymarket.

Pakistan

A 23 kilometer rickshaw rally was organized in Lahore by the Mazdoor Kisan Party (MKP) and Punjab Rickshaw Union (PRU) to mark the day.

Thousands of rickshaw drivers participated in the rally which passed through the major centers of Pakistan’s largest city.

The rally was addressed by MKP leader Taimur Rahman and Baba Najmi, a revolutionary Punjabi poet who raised the pertinent issues of the working classes in the country such as a decent minimum wage, better implementation of the labor rights laws and protection against capitalist exploitation.

Haqooq-e-Khalq (HKP) organized another rally in Faisalabad and Lahore to mark the day.

Sri Lanka

The ruling National People’s Power (NPP) and several other parties held large-scale rallies to mark May Day in different parts of the country, including in the capital, Colombo.

President Anura Kumara Dissanayake attended one of these rallies in Talawakelle, where he extended the May Day greeting and underlined his government’s policies to bring the country out of its prolonged economic crisis.

President Dissanayake also posted a May Day message online, inviting greater public participation to help build a “collective effort” to improve the conditions of the working population in the country.

Bangladesh

In Dhaka, the Workers’ Party of Bangladesh (WPB) held a rally to commemorate May Day. The rally, which passed through crucial parts of the capital, was attended by most of the senior leaders of the party.

Noting how in Bangladesh, “labor exploitation persists across sectors-from informal work to industrial production. Minimum wages are not ensured, and the ruling bourgeoisie class consistently fails to protect workers’ interests,” the WPB, in a press release on the occasion, vowed to continue its struggle for a better and just world.