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India: Tirupur Textile Associations Explore Common Wage Pact

In another first, Tirupur could be on its way to having a common wage across the cluster. As the existing wage agreement for textile workers of Tirupur is about to end, the Tirupur Exporters' Association (TEA), the South India Hosiery Manufacturers' Association (SIHMA) and four other textile associations of the textile hub are exploring a new common wage agreement for the workers.

As of now, there is no common wage agreement for the whole textile work force in Tirupur. SIHMA, along with a few other associations, sign a separate wage pact for the workers in agreement with the labour unions. TEA along with a few other associations signs a different wage pact. The pay scale for the different verticals of the textile and garmenting sector like packing, knitting machine operations, tailoring, damage checking, ironing, fabrication and labelling is also different under both agreements.

A common agreement will bring parity in the pay scale of workers across the entire textile cluster. It will also make the negotiation procedure with labour unions easy, according to SIHMA. Post an introductory meeting attended by representatives of various Tirupur based knitwear associations, various trade unions have been asked to submit their joint demands before the wage revision talks are held. The unions had initially submitted their demands separately.