Speech made by mrs. Sandhya rani, ips, postmaster
general,
(business development & technology) ap circle, as chief guest in the
women’s convention held at hyderabad on 09.06.2013, in connection with the 9th
federal council of nfpe
President of the National Federation of Postal Employees
Women’s Convention, Mrs. Shakunthala, distinguished guests on the dais, leaders
and invitees who have come from across the country to attend the 9th Federal Council meeting of the National Federation of Postal
Employees, ladies and gentlemen, my heartfelt greetings to all of you. It is a
pleasure to be here with you today and I would like to thank the organizers for
inviting me.
From the time I joined the Department of Posts as an young
officer some 25 years ago, many changes have come in, especially in the role,
approach and scope of Trade union activism. The nature of industrial relations
and collective bargaining has also changed in the light of globalization,
technology, changed business processes, etc.
I would like to share, my thoughts with you today in the
context of three broad themes –
i. The first one
relates to Women & Trade Union movement in the Indian context,
ii. The 2nd one is about women in Department of posts,
iii. Thirdly I will
touch briefly upon about the significant organizational changes underway in
Dept.of Posts and possible responses while balancing our personal aspirations
and staff unions’ concerns.
In the context of Women and Trade Union movement, the
questions that are often asked are: inadequate women’s participation, equality
of women, discrimination in workplace, lack of adequate safeguards for women
employees, continuing with the responsibility of housework, etc. Women in our
country, as elsewhere in the world, have been discriminated against in every
sphere – within the family, at the workplace, in society and in
public/political participation. Women are increasingly joining the workforce to
supplement family income, especially in urban areas. In rural areas they have
always participated in agriculture labour and related works.
According to the Directorate General of Employment and
Training in 2005, among the 393 lakh job-seekers enrolled with them, only 106
lakhs are female job seekers. In other words female job seekers account for
only about 27% of the total job seekers. This is also indicative of the
fact that much of the employment of women is in unorganized sector pushing them
into exploitative and low end jobs.
Increased employment in organized sector, while empowering
women to earn higher incomes, and take up challenging jobs, has also made them
to more vulnerable to stress, struggle to balance work and home life and
sometimes to sexual harassment in different forms. Further, either due to personal
choices or due to the intangible glass ceiling operating very few women are
found in higher managerial positions.
Overall the unionized labour is a very small number in
our country, (less than 2% according to ILO in year 2000). According to the
National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO), in 1999-2000 out of total workforce
of 397 million, only 28 million workers were employed in the formal sector and
thus formally unionized. Active participation of women in labour union movement
has been historically very low. In recent times with overall decreasing union
memberships, far lesser number of women join them or actively participate in
the TU deliberations on regular basis. With few of them attending regular TU
meetings it is not unexpected that issues of concern to women employees do not
get center stage in union items. Women are also under-represented at all levels
of union leadership and decision-making.
I believe that Trade Union leadership can and should
do much more to encourage and facilitate participation of women in trade union
activities. Being effective home makers ensures that women have certain refined
skills, especially at balancing competing interests/concerns, negotiating
impossible situations. Hence, they should be encouraged to take up leadership
roles in the Union actively. Issues relating to women should also get center
stage, like lack of amenities in work places, exploitation, especially of
unorganized contingent women employees, often working long hours and not
drawing even minimum wages, etc. should be taken up actively. At the policy
level, Trade Unions can also take up the case of special investment
opportunities for female employees with say higher interest rates. This will help
the women become more secure and empowered as well as greater productive
investments will be made for development of the country. Another area that TUs
can also pushing for a special bench or special sessions of CAT and higher
Courts to be held periodically to handle cases field by Women employees on
priority, so that they are not required to miss office or use personal/home
time in running around CAT and other courts. Trade Unions should facilitate
greater leadership development and Training for its Women members.
My second theme relates to women employees in Department
of Posts. As per census of Central Govt. Employees, only 7.53% of total
Central Govt. Employees are women. However, an interesting aspect of this is
that in Communications and IT sector, the share of women employees is 12.20%.
It is p[ossible that in some Circles, especially in South India, the percentage
of women employees could be 30-50%. Surprisingly in Railways Women employees
are only 4.63% of the total work-force. Considering the number of railway
employees being the largest of the central govt. work force, in actual numbers
this would be much higher than many departments. It is seen that in AP postal
Circle less than 15% of total departmental staff are women.
In the Department of Posts there are several issues of
concern to women employees working as GDS, Post Women, Postal
Assistants, Post masters, Supervisors, Inspectors & Officers. Some
of these are lack of basic amenities in post offices, restrictions relating to
rule-38 or rotational transfers under spouse category, child care leave not being
granted on administrative grounds, posting of women in night sets, increasing
number of cases of sexual harassment at work place etc. Issues relating to
women GDS employees and especially of the unorganized sector contingent women
employees like sweepers, water women, scavengers, etc. which do not even form
part of the Trade Union activism.
Women employees face typical unreasonable biases in
the department like the perception of not being as capable as men at work.
Sometimes one comes across Supervisors asking for male members in the team so
that they can sit late hours to complete work! I do not obviously agree with
that view. Women employees are by and large committed and sincerely attend to
their work. They are the best asset that the department has. However, we do
come across instances of lack of adequate sensitivity in dealing with women
employees in the department.
For instance, majority of our POs are C class POs, usually
located in rural areas, which lack basic amenities or facilities.
Instructions exist about hiring good buildings. But sometimes practically such
buildings are not available. Ideally, as a policy all Departmental POs should
have own buildings with proper facilities, considering that Government is a
model employer. While this is not always feasible, considering the resource
gaps, the Divisional Heads should ensure that buildings with basic amenities
are hired, or landlord should be insisted upon to provide basic amenities.
Further, Divisional Head should also keep in mind availability of basic
facilities in a PO, while considering posting women employees there.
While the Central govt. rules require posting of spouses
to the same station, as far as possible, in practice there are lot of gaps
in implementing these instructions. The restrictive handling of Rule 38
requests under Spouse category based on lack of vacancy, non-fulfillment of
minimum 5 years condition for granting Rule-38 transfer, etc. should be used
sparingly by the competent authority. Sometimes adequate managerial posts may
not be available, but for the operative staff as far as possible spouse
category requests should be accommodated.
Another service condition that comes to mind is the
recognition that women as the principal home maker and allows them child
care leave. Though every women employee is entitled to avail 730 days of
child-care leave during her entire service, in practicality it is not being
granted owing to various administrative reasons. While the shortage of staff is
one reason, the other one is the reluctance of the fellow employees to
undertake additional responsibility if one among them is badly in need of
child-care leave and wants to avail it immediately. I must confess that I am
personally not a great advocate of child care leave as an entitlement, and that
it should be taken with great responsibility. However, I do recognize that
there will be certain conditions in an employee’s life that may require
granting of the same without delay. Women employees should use this privilege
judiciously and should be allowed to do so.
It is true that there are certain areas of work where women
are given priority in the department. One such thing that comes to my mind
relates to Compassionate appointments. Such appointments are restricted to 5%
in case of departmental employees, but for Grameen Dak Sewaks there are no such
restrictions. While assessing eligibility for compassionate appointment special
consideration is given to wife of the deceased employee in terms of calculation
of points, as well as selection. Under the definite, accurate and transparent
yard-sticks to assess the extent of indigent circumstances of the family of the
deceased employee, points are awarded to various attributes relating to
indigent circumstances. Any case which scores 51 points merit selection. IN an
obvious and encouraging policy guidelines for ensuring that dependent women get
a better chance, if the wife of the deceased is the claimant for compassionate
appointment and not her children; 15 additional points are awarded in her case
automatically. This boosts her chances of getting the compassionate
appointment. Trade Unions can do much to promote awareness about this provision
among all GDS employees and their families.
There are many women centric issues that TUs should
take up provision of Crèche/day care facility at or near work place with more
than 10 women employees; rest room/change room facility, annual medical checkup
for over 40 years women, taking a clear and uncompromising stand against sexual
harassment at work place, etc.
The third and last theme that I would like to touch upon
today relates to the significant organizational changes that Department of
Posts is undergoing. The issues that I would like to highlight relate to
the approach of all officers and employees, especially women employees in
meeting the emerging challenges. With an aim to retain the existing customer
base and also win new clientele and businesses several innovative technologies
are being put in place. Huge amount of technological changes are emerging in
the department. The Core System Integration applications, Core Banking
Solutions, the new initiatives relating to mail operations are going to herald
major changes in the way we do work in the Department. With this, the work
culture of the Department will see a sea-change. The departmental employees and
GDS at different levels need to rise to the challenge and do their best to make
this as smooth as possible. Officers, Post Masters and Supervisors need to work
with their System Administrators and
PAs as a team to reach higher standards of performance. With an aspiration to
provide the last mile connectivity to all kinds of services, 1,30,000 Branch
Post Offices are going to be provided with Hand held devises. It will certainly
make the life of GDS Branch Post Masters relatively easy, especially in terms
of book keeping. But it would also mean greater responsibility.
In the emerging changes in the technological and business
environment, we need to work in teams, understand our individual roles, educate
and skill our fellow colleagues. Unfair expectations of the administration, if
any, could surely be challenged. But we all should work towards realizing the
positive objectives of the major projects underway in the Department of Posts.
That is the only hope for us to remain relevant as an organization and play
significant role in the development of our country.
While at the micro level we all should work towards
making work places more safe and secure for women employees, there is an extra
responsibility on all of us to welcome the inevitable changes in a positive
manner and skill ourselves adequately to meet the changing needs of the
internal and external environment. I am sure in the Federal Council meetings
all related issues will be discussed in thread bare and based on your
respective ideological positions certain policy decisions will be taken. I
request that while balancing personal expectations/aspirations of the cross
section of employees, the organizational interests/requirements need to be kept
in mind.
In the final I believe each one of us should ask
ourselves the question to what extent we are making work places safe,
empowering and invigorating to women employees. And we each need to do our bit
to enhance the same in which ever office we are working in.
I wish all the participants at the Federal Council meeting
and especially women employees interesting discussions and courage to take
challenging decisions and work towards achieving the same.
I thank the organizers once again for inviting me to
this Women’s Convention.
