Chennai: With their job security at stake, employees of the Nokia’s Sriperumpudur manufacturing facility have threatened to go on a hunger strike on March 31.
“We also plan to approach Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa for protection of the job of employees and would strengthen the agitation after the Lok Sabha election,” M. Saravana kumar, president of the Nokia India Employees Union told reporters.
Nokia’s Sriperumbudur plant employs more than 8,000 people, most of whom are women. The number zooms to 30,000 when staff of its component suppliers such as Foxconn, Salcomp and others is added to it.
After sealing its transfer of sale deal with Nokia in May last followed by a host of tax disputes since then, the company has been giving indications of closing down its Chennai unit.
“There have been reports about Nokia diverting its production to plants in Vietnam and China resulting in a steep decline in the production in the Chennai plant from about 13 million mobile handsets per day to 1-4 million handsets as on date,” said the union’s honorary president and state CITU leader A. Soundararajan. “Due to the decline in volume of mobile phone produced at the factory, we fear there may be job losses,” he added.
