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Around 1,500 factory workers took part in the strike
Workers at the Samsung Electronics factory in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu have called off a strike that had lasted more than a month.
Around 1,500 workers from Chennai city participated in the strike to demand better wages, working facilities and recognition of a newly formed union.
A union activist who supported the workers told the BBC that although Samsung had not yet recognized the union, it had agreed to respond to other demands.
The strike was one of the largest the South Korean tech giant has seen in recent years.
It also threatens to cast a shadow over Prime Minister Narendra Modi's attempt to position India as a viable alternative to China for manufacturing activities.
On Wednesday, the Center of Indian Trade Unions (Citu), a politically backed national union that led the protests, announced the workers' decision to call off the strike after a meeting.
“During the meeting, it was decided that the workers would resume work on Thursday,” E Muthukumar told the BBC.
He added that the issue of registration of the new union – called Samsung India Labor Welfare Union (SILWU) – will be decided by a court.
“We decided to cancel the protest because Samsung management decided to engage with workers on all key demands, such as higher wages, medical insurance and better facilities. These discussions will therefore continue,” he said. he declared.
On Tuesday, representatives of the protesting workers met officials of the Tamil Nadu labor department.
After the meeting, state Industries Minister TRB Rajaa said the strikers had decided to return to work immediately and that Samsung had agreed “not to victimize workers just for participating in the strike.” .
He also said that the workers had agreed to cooperate fully with the management and that Samsung would file a written response to the charter of demands filed by them.
Samsung later released a statement welcoming Citu's decision to call off the strike.
“We will not take any action against workers who merely participated in the illegal strike. We are committed to working closely with our workers to make the Chennai plant a great place to work,” the statement said.
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The strike was supported by a national union called the Center of Indian Trade Unions.
The workers began their protest on September 9 near the factory in the city of Chennai, which employs nearly 2,000 workers and is one of its two factories in India.
The factory produces household appliances, contributing around a third of the company's annual turnover in India of $12bn (£9bn).
One of the workers' main demands was that Samsung recognize their union, believing that this alone could help them negotiate better wages and working hours with management.
Akriti Bhatia, a labor rights activist, told the BBC that multinational companies setting up factories in India often do not respect Indian labor laws, which grant workers the right to association and collective bargaining.
These companies, she explained, often avoid this situation by creating internal unions, which are run by workers only on paper, while management continues to exercise control over their decisions. They fiercely oppose politically supported external unions.
A source at Samsung earlier told the BBC that the organization “fully supports unions but not those supported by a third party”.
Earlier this year, hundreds of workers at an Apple supplier's manufacturing plant in Tamil Nadu also carried out a one-day strike to demand recognition of their union.
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