Bosch has reached a deal with striking staff at one of its factories in Southern India, with normal production expected to begin today. The company’s workers had been protesting since February. However, negotiations at another plant continue.
The German-owned auto component producer had been at loggerheads with staff at its Bangalore plant over wage increases, reports said.
A joint statement from Bosch senior vice president Soumitra Bhattacharya and the union’s president, N.M. Adyanthaya, said: “The settlement was reached after a long, but fruitful negotiation and we now look forward to reaching normalcy with effect from March 25.”
No details of the settlement were disclosed.
According to local Indian reports, wage negotiations with the employees’ union at Bosch’s Naganathapura plant, located on the outskirts of Bangalore, are still ongoing. However, sources in the Indian press suggested that a settlement was expected soon.
Bosch Group expects to report an operating loss for 2009 – its first negative operating result in 60 years. In January, it was announced that the company was to close its Cardiff, UK, auto electrical parts factory at the end of next year with the loss of up to 900 jobs. Initial plans had envisaged 300 redundancies this year and continued operation of a smaller business but this was rejected in favour of complete closure and the transfer of work to Hungary.
