Telugu Film Industry Declared A One-Day Strike

With the Telugu Film Producers` Council and AP Film Industry Employees Federation at loggerheads, the one-day token strike is likely to be extended for more than a week. The producers` council had declared a one-day strike in protest against AP stunt men assaulting a kin of a stunt master on Wednesday and also had sought an explanation from the employees union for their misconduct.

The producers council was waiting for a delegation of the employees union to come and discuss Wednesday`s incident, but it instead received a "letter" faxed by the
employees union informing that the employees were reluctant to resume work until their long-pending issues were resolved.

Majority of the employees objected to the one-sided decision of the producers to halt work without prior notice, and resolved not to attend work until their issues are
settled. "We were disappointed with the ad hoc decision of the Film Producers` Council. After the incident, they could have sought an explanation from us, and then announced the strike; instead, they did it the other way around.

It looks like there are different sets of rules for producers and employees. Employees can go on strike only after serving a 15-day notice whereas they halted all the shootings overnight," said Mr Rajeshwar Reddy, general secretary, AP Film Industry Employees` Federation.

The issue of getting stuntmen from Chennai has remained unresolved for many years. Most of the stunt directors like Peter Heins, Stunt Siva and Ram Lakshman are from Tamil Nadu.

Senior producer Suresh Babu said that wages were paid to the local technicians on par with Chennai and they are revised every three years. The next wage revision date is on February 2011, and it would be looked into.