The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has asserted that the right to form trade unions and resort to collective bargaining should exist in the information technology sector, even as the government warned that attempts were being made to prevent India from taking a lead in the IT and business process outsourcing space.

"Everyone is waiting to see that India does not get a lead in BPO," Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran said, referring obliquely to a spate of media reports portraying the BPO industry in bad light.

However, he said nothing about the possible impact on the industry of a CPI(M) decision to refer the issue of workers' rights in the BPO industry to a committee that would submit a report to the party's central committee.

After a meeting here of the party's Politburo, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said the IT sector could not be exempted from Left-sponsored strikes, although certain services 'of continuous nature' and enterprises engaged in 'essential services' could be given a breather.

This implied that the right to strike work also existed, Karat said. The party's assertion came after detailed discussions on this issue in the Politburo meeting.

Karat said the Politburo, which also included West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, 'unanimously' came to this conclusion.

The party's clarification came in the backdrop of Bhattacharjee's declaration early this month that political and administrative measures would be taken to ensure that strikes did not affect the IT sector.

He had assured representatives of the IT and ITES sectors that there would be no repetition of September 29 when people, associated with these sectors, were prevented from going to work during a nation-wide industrial strike called by the Left parties.

That Bhattacharjee had argued on behalf of the IT and ITES sectors at the Politburo meeting was evident from the proposal that certain services 'of continuous nature', like BPO, could be partially exempted from strikes.

The CPI(M) is, however, likely to come out with a definite policy framework on the issue of strikes in the IT sector later. The Politburo today decided to prepare a 'comprehensive document' on the nature of work and services in the IT sector.