Interim Report - REPORT_NO133, 1972

1. 197. The Committee examined this case previously at its November 1970 session, when it submitted to the Governing Body an interim report contained in paragraphs 207 to 234 of its 120th Report, approved by the Governing Body at its 181st Session (November 1970).

A. A. The complainants' allegations

1. 198. The case consisted essentially in the following allegations: a number of workers were said to have been arrested while on strike, and a fire was alleged to have been started by the employers themselves to provide a pretext on which to arrest the leaders of the union; it was asserted that workers had been arrested and brutally assaulted, and that some of them were still in custody without ever having been formally charged; the sole purpose behind all these anti-union measures was allegedly to crush the union.
2. 199. In paragraph 234 of its 120th Report, the Committee recommended the Governing Body to draw the attention of the Government to the importance which the Committee attaches to the principle that trade unionists who are arrested for political offences or crimes under ordinary law should receive a fair trial at the earliest possible moment by an impartial and independent judicial authority, and to request the Government to be good enough to furnish the texts of any judgements delivered in any of the cases referred to in the complaints, together with the grounds adduced therefor.
3. 200. On 8 May 1972 the Government forwarded the text of a judgement pronounced by the Judicial Magistrate First Class (IInd Court), Bangalore City, on 24 January 1972. It emerges from this judgement that the case against two workers who had been charged, together with seven others, with setting fire to stables at the Bangalore Turf Club, injuring horses and damaging a polo ground was not proceeded with owing to lack of evidence.
4. 201. According to the information supplied by the Government, the cases against some of the other accused were heard separately since they had failed to put in an appearance, the charges against some of them were dropped, and the cases against the others have been transferred to the long-pending register.
5. 202. It appears that none of the accused is now in custody.