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60-A Charu Avenue • Kolkata-700 033 • Phone : (033)24242862 • Fax : (033)24244943 • www.fmrai.org • E-mail : fmrainews@gmail.com

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Former leader of FMRAI and national leaderof CITU Comrade P K Ganguly passed awayon 15 April 2015 night at his residence in NewDelhi after prolonged illness. He was 82.

Comrade Ganguly joined medical andsales representatives’ movement at Patna byend of 1960s and became the president ofBSSR Union in 1972. Under his leadershipthree way struggles developed in FMRAI inearly 1970s – fight against trade unionreformism; fight against drug multinationals andfor self reliance in drug production in thecountry; and for trade union rights of themedical and sales representatives.

When the then leadership of FMRAI supportedthe emergency in the country, he fought againstemergency rule. When they supportedmanagement-sponsored field staff associationline, he fought against it and built up councilmovement. He fought against their disruption linein West Bengal and moved in different parts ofthe country to unify the field workers on struggleline. Ultimately, the then leadership was defeatedin 1976 election of FMRAI with P K Gangulybecoming an office bearer.

He was one of the main campaigners inanti-Glaxo movement during 1972-73 withclarion call of nationalization of all multinationaldrug firms and for self-reliance of the countryin drug production which led to the revival ofAll India Chemical & PharmaceuticalEmployees Federation in 1974.

In fighting for trade union rights in thecompany – Suhrid Geigy of Sarabhai-Squibbgroup, where he had been working as amedical representative, he was dismissed fromservices in 1974. Since then he became a tradeunion whole-timer with associated hardship hisfamily had to bear.

Later, he was asked by CITU’s founder

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��� ������Protesting against management’sgross unfair labour practices onvarious counts, breaking hithertofollowed practices and demandingimmediate holding purposefulnegotiation on FMRAI’s pendingcharter of demands dated 26 March,2014; responding to the call of FMRAI,320 German Remedies field workers,including non-members, resorted toa day’s countrywide notified strike on21 April and staged dharnas in frontof company’s establishments.Expressing solidarity with strikingfield workers, council subcommittees organized gate meetingsat Guwahati, Patna, Cuttack, Jaipur,Zirakpur (Chandigarh), Indore, Durg,Cochin, Vijayawada, Hyderabad,Madurai, Kolkata, Lucknow, Chennaiand Stockist at Dindigul. Leaders ofFMRAI, State units and GermanRemedies council addressed thosegate meetings. In many dharnaplaces the illegal settlement of 19March was burnt. FMRAI’s councilsub-committees also protested some

Unfair Labour Practice by German Remedies��������������������������������

field managers who attempted tobreak the strike in some places.

Management grossly violatedvarious legal provisions and resortedto unfair labour practices whichinclude signing settlement with FSAfor all SPEs as if it is the ‘recognizedunion’ under MRTU & Pulp Act;incorporating non-wage issuesincluding newer ‘conditions of service’and converting them from time-rated

workers to piece-rated workers inthis illegal settlement as each pieceof the MOU became part ofemployment contract; connectingthe ‘memorandum of understanding’as a part of the settlement and,thus, imposing a ‘standing order’ inabsence of any registered standingorder for the SPEs through this ‘wagesettlement’ besides breaking the

In a significant development, onApril 2, the government of Assamdeclared minimum wage for the salespromotion employees (SPEs)working in the state, in addition to thepharmaceutical industry engaged in(i) cosmetics, soaps, householdcleaners and disinfectants; (ii)readymade garments; (iii) soft drinkmanufacturing industries; (iv) biscuitsand confectionaries; (v) Ayurvedic,Unani, and Homoeopathic medicines;(vi) automobiles includingaccessories and spare parts; (vii)surgical equipments, ar tificialprosthesis and diagnostics; (viii)electronics, computers includingaccessories and spares; (ix) electricalappliances and (x) paints andvarnishes. With immediate effect, theminimum rate of wage for the SPEswas fixed at Rs 12,500 per month.Additionally, SPEs shall be entitledfor variable dearness allowance(VDA) @75% over the rise and fall ofIndex point in the all India ConsumerPrice Index for Industrial Workers(AICPI-IW) which will be calculatedon the basis of change in CPI as onthe date of effect of the fixed rate ofminimum wages (i.e. April 2, 2015)and to be paid thereafter on sixmonthly basis.

See page-2

At Kolkata (More Photos, Page 3)

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MAY DAY GREETINGSThe Secretariat of FMRAI greets all

members, units and fraternalorganizations on the occasion of MayDay, 2015. We pledge to carry on our

work in building unity of workers andtoilers; and united struggle to resist

attacks and advance.

See page-2

See page-2

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� MAY 2015 �

Sham Executives to ShameMedical Representatives

Dateline 31 March, 2015; Hyderabad edition of Economic Times (ET) publisheda news captioned “Pharma firms like Pfizer and others replace medicalrepresentatives with new age executives” and concluding that “general medicalrepresentative may find it tough to explain to a doctor the complex and high-margin drugs they are pushing”.

This article is part of drug corporates’ propaganda blitz for pushing patenteddrugs in Indian market. It is two-way propaganda of drug corporates followingIndo-US pharma working group, formed by US President Barak Obama and IndianPrime Minister Narendra Modi during Modi’s US visit in September, 2014.

On one side there is attempt to replace ‘brand – generic (chemical names)’division, as in India, by ‘patent-generic (off-patent)’ division of medicines, as indeveloped capitalist countries. In capitalist system the market competitionnecessitates brand promotion of a commodity. Drugs product cannot be promotedin India like other commodities through print or electronic media or internet. Anexclusive law – The Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisement)Act, 1954 was created and still exists especially for brand promotion of drugcompanies products exclusively through medical representatives. Under thislaw, no ‘new age executive’ can promote pharmaceutical products.

Suddenly, a high profile campaign is launched stating that there is no need of‘brands’ in medicines i.e. there is no need of sales promotion of medicines whichmeans that there is no need of market competition in medicines! Then why theprivate companies would manufacture medicines, that too in a stage when neoliberaleconomic policies are ruthlessly being implemented! Modiji, Amir Khan, NavinPatnaik et al, who do, dream and die for corporates; plus now-removed scamtainted health ministers of Madhya Pradesh and of Jammu & Kashmir allowed theirphotos and names to be used to remove medicines’ ‘brands’ to be replaced by‘generics’ as their hearts are crying out for ‘poor’ people of India! No such salespromotion is necessary for patented medicine, it being a monopolized commodity.

This attack on medical representatives is deep-rooted. Only in India medicaland sales representatives are organised in professional-category union, FMRAI;conducted many struggles during more than five decades; created special law -The Sales Promotion Employees (Conditions of Service) Act (SPE Act) - forthemselves; got covered under all labour laws in the country, through SPE Act,after they were declared outside the purview of labour laws in May & Baker caseby Supreme Court in 1956; brought state amendments in I. D. Act; brought themin industry schedules under Minimum Wages Act and fixed minimum wages forthem; got legally notified working hours and timings in several states; formednational tripartite standing committee for them; etc.

Neoliberal policy wants to destroy all these. This story in ET is a poorlyprepared story for this, to put the medical representatives in bad light. It gotmixed up with organised sector drug companies’ attempt to keep their salespromotion employees outside the reach of the union – be it by formation ofsponsored field staff associations, by categorizing them as ‘M4 officers’ as inPfizer as back as in mid-70s; or wide-spread use of differently named ‘executives’as ‘sales officers’ beginning about two and half decades before. ‘New ageexecutives’ indeed!

Ill informed ET editor should know that the existing special law, the SPE Act,defines ‘Sales Promotion Employee’ as ‘“sales promotion employee” means anyperson by whatever name called (including an apprentice) employed or engagedin any establishment for hire or reward to do any work relating to promotion ofsales or business, or both’. A sales promotion employee is a ‘worker’ under lawby whatever name called – ‘medical representative’ or ‘new age executive’.

ET story referred to Pfizer as a symbol of drug companies recruiting the ‘newage executives’. Unfortunately for them, there is another story on Pfizer as a symbolof deception and cheating the law in respect of these ‘new age executives’. Oncomplaint of FMRAI, inspectors under SPE Act inspected the premises of Pfizer on22 December, 2010 and got written undertaking from the management and inspectionreport, counter-signed by the management, declared that total number of ‘SalesPromotion Employees’ in Pfizer was 1985 on the day of inspection including 901named as Professional Service Officers (PSOs), 180 named as Sr. PSOs, 786 nameas Trainee PSOs, 88 named as Product Specialists (PS) and 30 named as Sr. PS inthe company. These are the ‘new age executives’ in Pfizer. For violation of SPE Actin respect of these ‘new age executives’ by Pfizer, prosecution case, filed by theGovernment of Maharashtra in CJM court in Mumbai, is still continuing.

ET story, however, is totally blank on ‘industry analysts’ or ‘professionalexecutives’ giving details as to the supposed improvement in business volumeand profit after engaging these “new age executives’. At least in Pfizer, theperformance of these not-the-least-new-age executives in respect of turnoverand profitability is far behind when compared with that of the ‘poor’ ‘generalmedical representatives’ who are working in Pfizer consequent to merger of Wyeth.

This is the limitation of paid-news.

existing practice of holding simultaneousnegotiations, reaching to a commonconclusion and signing separate butidentical settlements with both the unions.(see FMRAI News, April, 2015)

Subsequently FMRAI wrote to themanagement on 14 April expressing itspreparedness to withdraw its strikedecision on written communication frommanagement that they would beginnegotiation with FMRAI’s committee for thepurpose of signing a wage settlementwithout linking it with MOU, as per past

practice and without bringing anyextraneous matter like the purportedsettlement which management declined toaccept.

Shortly, FMRAI is going to filecomplaint memorandum to theMaharashtra labour commissioner urgingnot to register the disputed settlementdated 19 March; effective intervention inthe management’s unfair labour practiceand admit FMRAI’s charter of demandsdated 26 March, 2014 into conciliation /adjudication.

from page-1 German Remedies Strike

The secretariat of FMRAI congratulatedthe field workers of Assam for theirdetermined struggle and the achievement.

Such notification was issued under therelevant provisions of the Minimum WagesAct, 1948 following the recommendationsof the Minimum Wages Advisory Boardwhich were finalized in its meeting dated23 September, 2014. The meeting waschaired by the labour minister of Assamand was par ticipated by labourcommissioner and deputy labourcommissioner of Assam; tworepresentatives from IDMA; Assam CITU’sgeneral secretary Deben Bhattacharya;CRU’s general secretary Bijan Das and itsjoint general secretary Rahul

01.05.2015

HR manager of USVfound guilty

The deputy general manager (HRD) of M/s USV Limited was found as “culprit” bythe assistant labour commissioner, circle II, Visakhapatnam for not issuing appointmentletter in Form A and referred the matter to the 2nd Chief Metropolitan Magistrate court to“punish the guilty as per law”.

N Subramanyam, assistant labour commissioner, circle II, Visakhapatnam wasappointed as inspector to examine a complaint filed by APMSRU against USV for notissuing appointment letter in Form A to the company’s seven sales promotion employeesworking at Visakhapatnam.

During inspection, USV Limited was identified as an establishment under Section2(A) of the SPE Act. On 27 September, 2014 it was also found by the assistant labourcommissioner that the complaint of APMSRU was justified and USV did not issueappointment letter in Form A in gross violation of Section 5 and clause 22(1) of theSPE Act and Rules. Such violation was identified by the labour authority as punishableunder Section 9 of the Act.

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Purakayastha.During the meeting of the Minimum

Wages Advisory Board, Bijan Das andRahul Purakayastha placed their views onbehalf of the SPEs. They pointed out thatthe SPEs should be treated as highly skilledworkers considering their nature of job.They were supported by DebenBhattacharya. Finally, the labourcommissioner concluded that theemployers’ representatives were givenenough opportunity being heard; that therewere no procedural lapses on the part ofthe government in fixing the minimumwages for SPEs and came to the conclusionthat the minimum rates of wages for SPEsought to be Rs 12,500 per month.

President ComradeB T Ranadive to shiftto CITU centre inDelhi to undertakehigher nationalresponsibility. At allIndia centre of CITUComrade P KGanguly led manystruggles. ComradeGanguly was one ofthe nationalsecretaries of CITUduring 1983 – 2003till his health couldpermit. He was thefounder generalsecretary of BeediWorkers Federation(CITU); convener ofAll India CoordinationCommittee of Un-organised SectorWorkers Unions(CITU); editor ofCITU journals –Working Class andCITU Mazdoor.

Comrade P K Ganguly leftbehind his son Arup and daughterRupu with their respectivefamilies.

FMRAI pays respectful

homage to Comrade P KGanguly, dips its flag and sendsheart-felt condolence to hisbereaved family members.

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Demanding of their jobs inTorrent; immediate release ofsalaries and reimbursement ofexpenses, the field workers ofElder Pharmaceuticals Limitedthroughout the country,irrespective of their divisions,resorted to a day’s hunger strikeon 23 April. On the day, Elderfield workers along with thecouncil subcommitteemembers staged dharnas anddemonstrations before Torrentestablishments and submittedmemoranda at Guwahati,

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Hyderabad, Jaipur, Patna,Chandigarh, Ranchi, Lucknow,Cuttack, Chennai and Kolkata.In Kolkata, the gate meetingbefore Torrent zonal office wasaddressed by FMRAI’ssecretary Santanu Chatterjee;its treasurer Partha Rakshit;Elder all India convener andWBMSRU’s general secretarySumahan Chakrabor ty; itssecretary Sanjay Sen; Elderjoint all India convener BasabRoychowdhury and others.WBMSRU’s vice president

Sumit Roy presided.Elder Pharmaceuticals

closed and sold two of itsmarketing divisions to Torrent.Under Section 25FFa, the jobsof all sales promotionemployees of these divisionswere supposed to beautomatically transferred toTorrent with continuation ofservice and other legal rights.But, once the deal wasfinalized, Torrent managementrefused to take 153 Elder fieldworkers. An undated letter wasjointly issued by both the Elderand the Torrent managementsin an attempt to usurp the legalrights of the field workers onjob continuation in case oftransfer of establishments bymeans of unfair labour practiceand in violation of mutuallyagreed memorandum ofunderstanding. This was aconspiracy of Elder-Torrentmanagements to end the fieldworkers’ trade union andcollective bargaining rights.

Gate meeting at Kolkata

Alkem field workers are once again gearing upfor two days country-wide strike on 29-30 May inpursuance of their long pending demands includingFMRAI’s charter of demands for the field workersof the company pending since December, 2013and for resolution of victimization issues.

On the first day of the strike, Alkem fieldworkers and council subcommittees will meet thedistributors at their respective headquarters andwill hand over a memorandum for onwardsubmission to the management. On thesecond day of the strike, all Alkem field workerswill stage day long dharna in front of their offices/ C&F agents at the state capitals. Prior to thestrike, subunit Alkem council meeting shall beheld for mobilization. FMRAI’s councilsubcommittees at every level will help and extendsolidarity to the Alkem field workers.

Alkem field workers have been patientlypursuing their demands which include settlement

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Condolence

Comrade Pulakesh Majumder, 54, a fieldworker working in Geno Pharmaceuticals diedon 25 April. He was suffering from cancer andwas under treatment in a hospital at Kolkatawhere he died. He left behind his old motherand wife.

Comrade Pulakesh was the convener ofWBMSRU’s Geno council and made

contributions in field workers movement as well as indemocratic movement. Large number of field workers, leadersof FMRAI and WBMSRU paid tributes when his mortal remainswas brought to FMRAI office on the way to crematorium.

FMRAI condoles the sad demise of Comrade PulakeshMajumder and sends heartfelt condolence to the bereaved family.

ComradeRavi ChandelComrade Ravi Chandel,

57, a field worker of Pfizer(erstwhile Wyeth) andmember of MPMSRU’sChhindwara unit died on 1March. He was suffering fromcancer. He left behind hiswife, daughter and son.

FMRAI mourns the saddemise of Comrade RaviChandel and sends heartfeltcondolence to the bereavedfamily.

of charter of demands dated 21 December, 2013;constitution of grievance redressal forum for thefield workers under Section 9c of IndustrialDisputes Act; appointment letters in Form A andcompliance of leave rules and other provisionsof SPE Act and resolution of pending victimizationissues. In pursuance of their legitimate demands,Alkem field workers successfully resorted tovarious industrial actions including jointmemorandum submission, nation-wide strikes,march to head office at Mumbai etc. Instead ofacceding the just demands, managementresorted to fresh victimization of north zone jointzonal convener through dismissal.

Under the circumstances, all India council(AIC) meeting of Alkem, held on 17 February ofthis year decided to resort to further industrialactions including strikes. The AIC meetingdecided to pursue the pending charter ofdemands legally also.

Comrade Pulakesh Majumder

APMSRUAnanthapur

The annual general bodymeeting of APMSRU’sAnanthapur unit, held on 5 Aprilwas inaugurated by its generalsecretary A G Rajamohan.CPI(M)’s district secretary VRambhupal Reddy greeted thepar ticipants. Activity repor tplaced by the unit secretary

was discussed and adopted.The new unit committee waselected with G Narendra aspresident, A Rambhupal Reddyas secretary and C Sivaiah astreasurer. APMSRU’s secretaryG Manohar along with itstreasurer D Prasad was alsopresent.

KMSRA members of Palakkad district attending foundationstone laying ceremony of their own building on 21 March.A. K. Balan, MLA, laid the foundation stone.

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At Vijayawada

At Jaipur

At Madurai

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Printed by D P Dubey, published by D P Dubey on behalf of Federation of Medical and Sales Representatives’ Associations of India and printed at SatyajugEmployees Co-operative Industrial Society Ltd. 13 Prafulla Sarkar Street, Kolkata-700 072 and published at 60-A, Charu Avenue Kolkata-700 033

EDITOR : D P DUBEY

Registration No. WBENG/2001/6430 Postal Registration No. KOL RMS/106/2013-2015

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Durg

MPMSRURatlam

The annual general bodymeeting of Durg unit ofMPMSRU, held on 19 April wasattended by 94 members.Reports placed by unitsecretary Vivek Satake and

Sagar

treasurer Lalit Dewangan werediscussed and adopted.MPMSRU’s leader Anupamand steel employees’ unionleaders S K Pali and S P Deygreeted the participants.

182 MPMSRU members of Ratlam unit including two of itssatellite units namely Mandsaur and Neemuch attended their unitconference on 19 April. Reports placed by unit secretary ManishDixit and treasurer Pankaj Mehta were adopted followingdiscussions. A new unit committee was elected unanimously.Ashwini Mehta presided.

89 comrades attended theAGB meeting of Sagar unit,held on 26 April. Followingdiscussion, both the reports ofunit secretary, placed byVirendra Goswami and bytreasurer Sanjay Soni were

adopted unanimously. Meetingco-opted 5 unit committeemembers with vacancies.MPMSRU president S KTalukdar and state treasurerAnurag Saxena guided andaddressed the meeting.

UPMSRA

Moradabad

Lucknow200 members of UPMSRA’s

Lucknow unit attended in theAGB meeting, held on 19 Aprilat Udyan Bhawan. Followinghoisting organizational flag byunit president Arun Singh, theAGB meeting was formallyinaugurated by statecommittee member SubrataBanerjee. Leaders of FMRAIand UPMSRA which includeR.P.Singh, Rakesh Pandeyaddressed and greeted themeeting. CITU’s UP statepresident R.S.Bajpayee andother fraternal organizationleaders also greeted the AGB

meeting. Sarvesh Gupta wasthe state observer.

Secretary and treasurerreports were adopted followingdiscussion by members. Meeting

elected 35 member executivecommittee with Arun Singh aspresident, Surojeet Mukherjee assecretary and Anwar HafeezSiddiqui as treasurer.

annual general body meetingon 19 April. UPMSRA’s vicepresident Arvind Tiwari andCITU’s district coordinatorVishnu Sharma addressed. Unitsecretary Manoj Chaudharyand treasurer Sanjay Narangplaced their reports which wereadopted after vivid discussion.A 19 member new unitcommittee was elected andNagesh Pathak, president;Manoj Chaudhary, secretaryand Sanjay Narang, treasurerwere re-elected.140 members of UPMSRA’s Moradabad unit attended their

BSSRUPatna

Sitamarhi

104 BSSRU members fromthree units of Patna namelyCentral, West and Southattended their annual generalbody meeting on 2 April whichwas inaugurated by BSSRU’svice president SanjayChatterjee. Reports placed byunit secretaries and treasurerswere adopted after discussion.BSSRU’s general secretaryDevashis Roy greeted.

70 members of BSSRU’sSitamarhi unit attended theirannual general body meetingon 19 Apr i l which wasinaugurated by BSSRU’sleader Rakesh Kumar andaddressed by its secretary RS Ray. Uni t secretar yAvinash Kumar andtreasurer Alok Kumar placedtheir repor ts which wereadopted fo l lowingdiscussion. Manoj Kumarpresided.

South Howrah-2

WBMSRU

105 WBMSRU members ofsouth Howrah local committee-2 attended their annual generalbody meeting, held at ComradeSamar Mukherjee Manch ofComrade ShyamaprasannaBhattacharya Hall which wasinaugurated by WBMSRU’s vicepresident Shyamal Majumdar.

Local committee secretary NiloyBanerjee and treasurer SandipBose placed their reports whichwere discussed by 9participants and were adopted.WBMSRU’s state committeemember Partha Banerjeeaddressed. Rajib Choudhurypresided.More News, See page-3