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"CEO murdered by mob of sacked Indian workers
(AFP PHOTO/Deshakalyan CHOWDHURY)
Work protests coud threaten India's economy
More than 60 people were arrested and more than 20 were in hospital yesterday.
A spokesman for the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry said: “Such a heinous act is bound to sully India’s image among overseas investors.”
The murder has stoked fears that outbreaks of mob rule risk jeopardising the sub-continent’s economic rise. Thousands of violent protesters recently forced Tata, the Indian conglomerate that owns Land Rover and Jaguar, to halt work on a plant being built to produce the world’s cheapest car, the £1,250 Nano. The move could result in £200 million in investment costs being written off.
Tata stopped work three weeks ago, saying that it could not guarantee its workers’ safety at the factory in the state of West Bengal. The billionaire industrialist Mukesh Ambani said that the Nano crisis showed how protesters were creating “a fear psychosis to slow down certain projects of national importance”. Other companies, including Vedanta, the London-listed mining company, have encountered similar problems in India.
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" Indian govt backs workers who killed boss: police, reports
NEW DELHI (AFP) — Sacked workers in India beat to death the boss of the Italian company that had laid them off, police said on Tuesday, in a killing the government described as a "warning for management."
India's labour minister declined to criticise the attack, saying it "should serve as a warning for management."
"Workers should be dealt with with compassion," Oscar Fernandes told reporters in New Delhi, according to the Press Trust of India news agency. "The workers should not be pushed so hard that they resort to whatever happened."
Media reports said workers at Graziano Transmissioni were dismissed after they demanded pay rises and allegedly ransacked the firm's offices in the Delhi suburb of Greater Noida, where many multinational companies are based.
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