After three days of near total strike, which threatened to bring road transportation in the country to a grinding halt, the central government forced the workers of public sector oil companies to end their agitation on the evening of January 9, 2009, with arrests, sackings and threats of mass dismissal.

Workers of 13 public sector oil companies had gone on an indefinite strike since 7 January, demanding higher pay scales. The workers, led by the Oil Sector Officers Association (OSOA), went on strike in defiance of a high court order declaring the strike ‘illegal’. Prior to this, for several months, the oil sector workers have raised their concerns with the petroleum ministry, expressing their complete dissatifaction at the 6th Pay Commission Reccomendations, which they felt had discriminated against workers of this sector.Instead of addressing their concerns, the Central Government on the one hand used savage force against the workers, and on the other hand, carried out a proaganda blitz through the print and electronic media, portraying the workers as “irresponsible”, “holding the country to ransom etc”. This is the typical method that the government of capitalists always use, to isolate and crush the agitation of any section of our working population  All sections of our working class must understand the tactics of the bourgeois governments and forge even better fightiing unity.

Home minister P. Chidambaram announced to the media early on January 9, that the central government intended to “act tough”.

The Central government invoked the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) to arrest more than 200 striking employees and forced them to apologise in writing. The governments in the states in which most of the refineries and pumping depots are located — such as Haryana, Maharashtra, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh and Goa — invoked ESMA and launched a crackdown  The Central government announced that all the 45,000 agitating employees would be arrested and later sacked.

The Central government got ONGC to dismiss 64 employees, and Indian Oil and GAIL to sack three each. The army marched into refineries and jet-fuel pumping stations, to intimidate the striking workers..

Two office-bearers of the Oil Sector Officers Association (OSOA) were arrested and brought to Parliament Street police station and pressured into changing their stance. They were granted bail on the condition that they “shall communicate with other employees of their offices by way of email and request and motivate them not to take part in any such strike”. Petroleum secretary R.S. Pandey then issued a warning to the striking employees to “join work immediately or face arrest under ESMA or the NSA (National Security Act).”

In this manner the government put pressure on the leadership, which had gone into hiding through the three-day strike period, to call off the strike.

Petroleum Minister Murli Deora has called the striking oil PSU workers ‘irresponsible’ for going on strike at  a time when the country is facing external pressures ‘such as from Pakistan’. At the same time, the government has given no assurances that the dismissed and suspended employees would be reinstated and those arested under ESMA would be released.

People’s Voice condemns the use of force and intimidation by the government to break the strike of the workers of the oil PSUs. It is a clear warning to workers in all other sectors as to what extent the government of the big capitalists will go to clamp down on the struggles of the working people. People's Voice calls upon all trade unions and working class organisations to come forward in solidarity with the oil sector workers, and force the government to release the arrested workers, reinstate the suspended and dismissed workers, as well as accede to the just demands of the oil sector workers.