After a gap of four years wages of all jute mill workers in West Bengal will increase from February, following a tripartite wage agreement signed among the state government, mill owners and central trade unions.

As per the agreement, wage hikes will be implemented for all categories of workers from February 3, 2024, benefitting around 3 lakh workers across 113 jute mills in West Bengal.

According to jute industry insiders, all parties agreed to sign the agreement after around one-and-half years of negotiations. The consensus was reached after nine tripartite and several bipartite meetings. The last agreement was signed in 2019.

As per the latest agreement inked on Wednesday, at entry level daily wage will be increased by around 30 per cent to ₹485 from ₹370.

The gross monthly salary for new workers joining jute mills will be ₹14,066, an increase of around ₹3,562 compared to the previous structure. For existing workers, monthly salary will increase to ₹17,271 from ₹16,718.

For jute workers, hired in 2019, gross monthly salary will witness an increase by ₹586 to ₹14,132. Workers, employed from 2002, will get a ₹627 hike in their monthly salary to ₹15,837, according to state government officials.

“Regarding the existing workers of the mill, management agrees to pay one-time ad hoc payment of ₹130 per month (for 208 hours) to all categories of existing workers. The additional amount will be added to the existing basic wages,” the terms of the wage settlement said.

Notably, housing allowance for all categories of workers has been raised to 7.5 per cent from 5 per cent.

“This wage hike is a cost burden to the jute industry that we have to embrace. And, we have to see how we can improve upon our efficiency and the other cost parameters to make up with the increased cost,” Indian Jute Mills Association (IJMA) chairman Raghavendra Gupta told businessline.

Gupta said after the wage hike, the overall wage bill will be increased by 5 per cent on an average for a jute mill. Wage bill is roughly 25 per cent of a jute mill’s total cost.

Former IJMA Chairman Sanjay Kajaria said the tripartite wage agreement has a “historic and holistic” approach. “In this agreement many long-pending issues have been addressed. As per the agreement, workers have been categoried into highly skilled, skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled, and each category has received a specific fitment allowance,” Kajaria said.

According to the agreement, the state productivity council will determine grading and scaling for workers in the next six months.

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