May day celebrated with zeal and enthusiasm in Mumbai

Mumbai, 1st May 2015

Bigul Mazdoor Dasta and Naujawan Bharat Sabha organized street plays , revolutionary songs, meetings and pamphlet distribution campaigns on the eve of 129th International Workers Day at Labor chowk, Sathenagar and other areas of Mankhurd region of Mumbai calling for workers to unite in order to struggle for their rights. Virat from Bigul Mazdoor Dasta addressed the workers and introduced the history of May day. He explained how 130 years ago workers launched their demands of 8 hour work , 8 hour rest and 8 hour entertainment. These were the demands for which workers of Chicago went on mass strikes which had horrified the capitalists. Two days later, on May 3rd , followed the barbaric repression of the workers when police ordered firing over one of the workers’ meetings in which six workers were killed . Following this , on May the fourth , a bomb was thrown over a crowd which had gathered to protest against the May 3 incident and workers were falsely charged for it. Eight of the workers’ leaders were prosecuted on false charges , four were awarded death sentence and rest others, life imprisonment. On May 1st , 1887 , workers decided to observe this day as International Workers’ Day. Despite the bloody repression of Chicago movement , workers of the world united and won the battle for eight hour workday . Thus May day is the true festival of workers of the world.

Satya Narayan of Naujawan Bharat Sabha said that 93 percent of workers in our country i.e. 56 crore workers are deployed in unorganized sectors, as contract labourers or daily wage toilers. They have no labor security and most of them are forced to work for more than eight hours and not even paid minimum wages. Thus it is the need of today that workers unite to struggle for their rights. After Modi sarkar came to power , labour laws have been astringently dissolved in favour of the factory owners and capitalists, making it easier for the owners to remove workers from work whenever desired. Environment laws have also been made floppy in favour of the capitalists and factory owners. All these decisions of the government are set to add further miseries to the lives of workers. Thus , in order to change things , we must remember the martyrs of May day and follow their path.

During the programme , revolutionary songs were performed along with a street play named “May Diwas” and thousands of pamphlets were distributed among the workers.