The Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) and members from the affiliated workers’ organizations met the Commissioner of Labour, Suresh Jadhav, and Managing Director of Film City Studios, Kailash Pagare, to appraise them of the problems faced by them.
President of FWICE, B.N Tiwari says, “It was a very fruitful meeting with Jadhavji and we are now hopeful that the workers who are at present facing a lot of issues like work timings, payment issues will find themselves in a better place after FWICE gets functional soon.”
Tiwari said that workers from all departments have been not been getting payments on time and there have been complaints about less payment also. “The role of FWICE in resolving all the issues faced by the workers is like a bridge between them and the producers,” he added.
He also said that FWICE and all its 31 craft associations have discussed the issues faced by them which the Labour Commissioner will be taking to the producers and hopefully all will be resolved soon.
With COVID cases on the rise across the country, the exhibition sector of the film industry is preparing for another uphill battle.
Industry sources though are thankful that the shooting of films and television continues without any hindrance. The reason is that there has been no change in the SOPs for film and TV production. While speaking to earlier, Ashok Dubey of Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) and FWICE Treasurer Gangeshwar Lal Srivastava had said, “There is no directive of reducing crew on set but we have told the producers to hire workers who are fully vaccinated.”