Page:Labour in Madras.djvu/127



LABOUR IN MADRAS 101 locked out thousands of honest and good labourers and threw them on the streets to starve. On behalf of the Madras Labour Union as its President, it is necessary that I should anstver Messrs. Biriny & Co.'s half truths and statements which without proper comment throw a slur on the excellent work done by the Union. Messrs. Binny & Co. begin by quoting a few passages from New India to show that the Madras Labour movement is enveloped by politics. I do not know what Messrs. Binny & Co. wish to imply by their quotations but it would clear the ground if I briefly say that this work began when a few ill-treated labourers came to me with sundry grievances. I did not go to them ; I did not seek them. They came to me, and on due enquiry I could find only one thing which I could immediately test, the incovenience and hardship which the labourers had to put up with because the midday recess time was only 30 minutes. I went to the sheds without any labourers, more than once, and watched the hurry, etc., attending the coming out the taking of food, the returning to the Mills and was convinced that that was a real grievance. Then I collected other facts-tales of ill-treatment by European Officers, ipadequate wages, etc., and after some consideration decided to go to a meeting and form a Labour Union. In doing so, I quite saw the opportunity of attaining more than one object. I classified them in mind: (1) the tension on the labourers to be removed by attention to their imme diate grievances. (2) the education of the labourers along healthy constitutional lines, in matters sociological; (3) the possibility of producing a factor, to be discussed, in