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 XIII. - Indebtedness

Collection:: Economics Books

230 CHAPTER XIII. definition given, for the risk is usually great. But the reluctance of civil courts to deal with issues not raised by the pleadings seems to have been the main obstacle. Objections to Legislation. The absence of more thorough-going attempts to deal with the evil is not due in any large measure to active opposition on the part of the interests likely to be affected. Such opposition bulks small against the mass of public opinion in India, which is believed to be generally in favour of vigorous action. A valuable indication of the trend of more expert opinion is the stress laid by some of the reports of the Provincial Banking Enquiry Committees on legislative remedies. So far as the com- parative inaction isnot due to inertia, it appears to be based partly on reluctance to interfere with the sanctity of contract and partly on lack of faith in the efficacy of legislation. The objection based on the sanctity of contract may have been genuine in the past; to-day it is difficult to regard it as more than an excuse. To talk of sanctity in connection with the normal contracts made between a money-lender and an illiterate in- dustrial worker is a grave misuse of a good word. The contract, in most cases, is unequal and unfair from the start. It is easy for a man to contract away his labour for years in a moment of thoughtlessness or at the call of some extravagant social demand. More serious consider- ation must be given to the view, held by a number of persons of experience, that legislation can achieve little ornothing. This view is not based on the belief that legislation in this sphere would be in advance of public opinion ; as we have said, opinion generally is well in advance of the existing law. The difficulty present to the minds of many of those who have considered the question is that of devising provisions which do not lend themselves to evasion by the money lender. Here the ques- bion is obviously one of degree. On the one hand, legislation which cannot be enforced is not merely useless but harmful ; it tends to impair the respect for law and to weaken public morality. On the other hand, there is no law which cannot sometimes be evaded with impunity. The Bengal Banking Enquiry Committee rightly say : “ The principal objection against promulgation of the measures we have proposed above is that they are liable to be evaded in various ways. But the fact that the provisions ofa law are capable of being evaded by fraudulent means should not deter the legislature from enacting a just and necessary measure for the pro- tection of the simple and the ignorant. The mere existence of the measure in the Statute Book would tend to educate and strengthen public opinion and make the law abiding and less adventurous among the money- lenders averse to making any attempt at evasion.” In our view the evils associated with the practice are so serious that the possibility of even a substantial amount of evasion should not deter the legislature from enacting measures which would strengthen to an appreciable extent the forces operating in favour of the freedom of the worker. It is clear that such measures can be devised, and we proceed to disenss some steps in this direction which appear desirable.

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