Report of the Royal Commission on Labour in India

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1850495947

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-233603

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Report of the Royal Commission on Labour in India

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: His Majesty's Stationery Off.

Year of publication:: 1931

Scope:: xviii, 580 S.; graph. Darst., Kt.

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Chapter VII. - Unregulated factories

Collection:: Economics Books

J8 CHAPTER VII. that these children were in the position of being obliged to work any number of hours per day required of them by their masters. They were without the protection of the law as regards their physical fitness bo labour, the number of hours they might be required to work without any interval or, indeed, any other of the more elementary protections afforded by the Factories Act in respect of child workers, and they were subjected in some cases to corporal punishment. Yet the bulk of such children were 2 to 5 years below the statutory working age in respect of child workers employed in factories under the Act. We understand that the local Government drew the attention of the industry to the position of these children as long ago as 1923, and that in 1927, after an enquiry which shewed that conditions were unchanged, made sug- gestions for the regulation of child labour. These included the fixing of a minimum age of 9 years and a maximum day of 8 hours for children up to 12 years. The factory owners were prepared to accept a minimum age of 8 years and to provide educational facilities, but the opposition of the master weavers prevented any agreement by their unwilling- ness to accept, either then or subsequently, any reduction in the work- ing hours. The matter of a voluntary trade agreement in respect of the working conditions of these children is believed still to be under consi- eration. We are convinced that here, as in the bids factories, official reculation is required primarily in the interests of the child worker. Tanneries. We received a considerable volume of evidence in respect of the conditions of tannery workers and took occasion to visit a number on the outskirts of the chief industrial cities. As the handling of skins and hides is obnoxious to most castes, the workers in this industry coms largely from the depressed classes. In every case {in contrast bo some of the larger tanneries which came under the Factories Act) we were struck by the lack of adequate sanitary arrangements, which make the bulk of such places even more offensive than is inevitable from the nature of the industry. Adequate drainage was absent and often the whole earth-floor space, spread over a wide area, was lifitered with heaps of evil-smelling refuse and sodden with pools of filthy water. There were no washing arrangements and, in the majority of cases, no latrine accommodation. In a number of instances the workers had no alternative but to eat the food they had brought with them in fhe midst of such surroundings. Hours were long, often 12 and some- times in excess of 12, and, whereas few women were employed, in the Madras Presidency children of from 8 to 12 years, as well as older boys, were found at work in the vats and elsewhere. Their hours sometimes exceeded those of the adults owing to the necessity of performing certain additional tasks such as water carrying, vat filling, etc., for which they receive no additional cash wages but merely two dholis a year. We feel that the statutory protection of the workers in this industry is essential because of the nature of the work and the class of worker smployed, which from long social tradition is peculiarly powerless to help itself.

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