-The Hindu Public Interest Litigation is a good thing when it is used to enforce the rights of the disadvantaged. But it has now been diluted to interfere with the power of the government to take decisions on a range of policy matters Judicial activism is not an easy concept to define. It means different things to different persons. Critics denounce judicial decisions as activist when they do not agree with them....

-The Business Standard Hiring contract labour must come with more commitments Almost a third of India’s organised labour force is on contract. This is an inevitable consequence of archaic labour laws that make it impossible for India Inc to disengage permanent workers even if they can’t afford them, don’t need them or they don’t perform. Companies such as Maruti Suzuki India have thus used contract workers liberally — almost half the workers...

-DNA It would be sad if the ghastly violence at Maruti Suzuki’s (MSIL) Manesar plant on July 18, 2012, in which a HR manager died, were to be understood simply as a ‘murderous workers’ vs ‘rational management’ kind of an incident. There is a history and a context to this violence, and how that is understood, and acknowledged, by India Inc. will indicate how serious we are about preventing such incidents...

-The Times of India Preliminary findings into the violence at the Maruti's Manesar plant has disproved the Maruti Suzuki Workers Union's allegations that the mob fury was triggered by "casteist comments" allegedly made by a supervisor against a dalit worker. Investigators claimed that the supervisor, Sangram Singh, was also a dalit like his alleged victim, permanent worker Jiyalal, and therefore could not have made abusive comments against him. MSWU had alleged the casteist...

-The Times of India The bloody and systematic attack on the senior management at Maruti's Manesar plant may have been the result of Naxal influence, according to sources within the government. Intelligence agencies have been asked to investigate whether Maoists are infiltrating trade unions in the Gurgaon-Manesar belt, which has witnessed serious labour trouble in the past few years, added the sources. The agencies are looking at a couple of trade unions...