CNBC-TV18 reported that labor unrest in Haryana, which has crippled production at Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India, continues even after the election polling got over earlier this week.

After Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India filed a petition in Punjab and Haryana High Court the Labour Department has submitted its reply and asked for more time.

Below is a transcript of Mr Swati Khandelwal Jain's comments on CNBC-TV18.

Haryana Labour Department has submitted its reply to Punjab and Haryana High Court. This is in response to HMSI‘s petition to the court to resolve the labor unrest problem at the HMSI plant. It has brought the production down by almost 50% for HMSI.

Sources indicate that the Labor Department has asked for more time to resolve the labor unrest problem and they are confident of getting some solutions soon. They said that they are trying their best but they need some more time.

In fact, sources indicate that there was a meeting today between the management, the labor department and the union, but it has been inconclusive so far.

The issue remains the fact that there has been a long term wage settlement plan which is still to be finalized and the workers are asking for salaries comparable to Hero Honda or Maruti workers, which the management is not ready to do so. So that has been the real bone of contention. But now the case is likely to come up for hearing on October 23.

Just to give a sense of how much has been the loss for HMSI in terms of revenue they have lost about INR 300 crore already in the last two and a half months. Also in terms of production loss, it has been about 55,000 to 60,000 units that they have lost and it is not just HMSI there is a problem coming in for nearby plant for Hero Honda, for Maruti as well and it started to come up because the labour unrest problem pretty much covers the entire Gurgaon belt.

(Sourced from CNBC-TV18)