16 
CHAPTER VII, 
day, and debilitation is often experienced after 3 or 4 months of regular 
work ”. In both provinces the workers are unorganised, but some of 
the employers are persons of education and,in at least one province, are 
well organised. We understand that suggestions made by the local 
Government for improving the sanitary and general conditions of the 
factories in a particular area have so far met with no response. 
“Bidi ’ Making, 
The making of the bids (the indigenous cigarette) is an industry 
widely spread over the country. - It is partly carried on in the home, 
but mainly in workshops in the bigger cities and towns. Every type 
of building is used, but small workshops preponderate and it is here 
that the graver problems mainly arise. Many of these places are 
small airless boxes, often without any windows, where the workers 
are crowded so thickly on the ground that there is barely room to 
squeeze between them. Others are dark semi-basements with damp 
mud floors unsuitable for manufacturing processes, particularly in an 
industry where workers sit or squat on the floor throughout the work- 
ing day. Sanitary conveniences and adequate arrangements for re- 
moval of refuse are generally absent. Payment is almost universally 
made by piece-rates, the hours are frequently unregulated by the employer 
and many smaller workshops are open day and night. Regular inter- 
vals for meals and weekly holidays are generally non-existent. In 
the case of adults these matters are automatically regulated by indivi- 
dual circumstances, the worker coming and going as he pleases and 
often, indeed, working in more than one place in the course of the week. 
Nevertheless in the case of full-time workers, ¢.e., those not using bids 
making as a supplementary source of income, the hours are too frequent- 
ly unduly long, the length of the working day being determined by 
the worker’s own poverty and the comparatively low yield of the piece- 
rates paid. ‘ 
Child Labour in “ Bidi ”’ Factories. 
The paramount matter for concern, however, in a number of 
areas, particularly in the Madras Presidency, is the question of child 
(i.e., boy) labour. In many cities large numbers of young boys are 
employed for long hours and discipline is strict. Indeed there is reason 
to believe that corporal punishments and other disciplinary measures 
of a reprehensible kind are sometimes resorted to in the case of the 
smaller children. Workers as young as five years of age may be found 
in some of these places working without adequate meal intervals or 
weekly rest days, and often for 10 or 12 hours daily, for sums as low as 
2 annas in the case of those of tenderest years. This recalls some of 
the worst features of child apprenticeship in Engiand at the time of the 
agitation prior to the passing of the first Factory Act, particularly when 
it is realised that many of the parents of these child workers are in 
debt to the employer. As a result they are not in a position to enquire 
too closely into the treatment meted out to their children or to do other 
than return an absconding child. Although it is impossible to give 
sven an approximate ficure of the numbers of such child workers in the