Labour unions oppose reforms but dare we hope for a new era of win-win industrial relations?

Some of these do appear to dilute labour rights at a formal level. For example, earlier, a company with under 100 employees could undertake layoffs without a government nod; now that limit has gone up to 300. In practice, how easy it is to lay off workers often depends on how organized they are.

Where worker organizations are weak, employers have been able to downsize staff with ease (and with labour rules taken as mere transaction costs). Even under the revised norms, it would be the effective strength of staff resistance that’s likely to determine how it goes.

But the real challenge does not lie in job reduction. It lies in finding innovative ways to achieve labour flexibility and skill upgradation with the active support and participation of workers.

Most of India’s central trade unions are affiliated to political parties that share the national goals of retaining and expanding our strategic autonomy in a world of shifting geopolitics and rapid technological change. Even India’s workforce can be assumed to favour an India that does not kowtow to any external power.

This demands rapid economic growth and success in sectors of strategic value, for which we must broadly ensure our resources are deployed in the best combination possible, even as we optimize production for best results at the employment level, using new technologies such as artificial intelligence if need be.

Across industries, the country’s priorities call for adaptive dynamism, flexible labour practices and constant reskilling and upskilling. Such agility is not costless. But we cannot expect labour alone to bear its cost.

We need mechanisms that distribute the burden among all stakeholders. This would rid our work transitions of conflict. Consider a company that hires, trains and deploys labour in response to market demand, supplying skilled workers to enterprises looking for them and taking back the laid off for reskilling.

This, of course, is how contract employment works. What if the contractor were the trade union itself, or a labour cooperative sponsored and supported by it, rather than a temping agency or an old-style labour agency? As skills evolve, if employers convey the kind of training they require, they could conceivably forge win-win arrangements with unions.

Many changes proposed by the code on industrial relations are sensible regardless of the lens used to view them. Every company should have just one union for its management to negotiate with, for example, and not a multiplicity.

Multiple unions could remain active among workers, but elected representatives could form a single union that meets the code’s test of majority support to hold talks with managers. Such a main union could routinely hold debates, with all workers invited to pitch in, and use widely held referendums to set its agenda. This would be democratic, efficient and permissible under the code.

Indian unions have a chance to play a role in forging a new era of worker relations with industry, one aimed at doing what serves our collective purpose as a nation. Of course, India Inc bears its share of responsibility too.