provided, but it is not necessary if there is a blank wall near at hand! And if the wall can be seen from neighbouring buildings, so much the better, as every roof and balcony will have its decoration of figures all centred on the gleaming open screen. To know how charming moving pictures may be, it is worth while to watch them in the open air on a cool Indian night when the surrounding roofs become galleries of the picture-house and the soft, rich scent of jasmine floats on the air. A considerable amount of teaching is done through night schools, and here again efforts are being made to provide special training for women, who, however, are slow to take advantage even of classes for sewing and knitting. A successful class is held in the midday recess in one of the Sholapur mills. About fifty attend it and learn reading, writing, and arithmetic, sewing and tailoring.

Two large groups of mills in Bombay that are prominent in their educational work, the Currimbhoy Ebrahim mills and the Tata mills, entrust their welfare work to the Social Service League, organized by members of the Servants of India Society. In these mills religious and moral education, by means of lectures, literature, and addresses is emphasized.

Social education includes not only mill schools, night schools, libraries, and similar activities, but also the inquiries into conditions of life throughout India, and more especially those made in industrial areas, that are being carried on under the direction of the Central Government through the Department of Industries, and by various Local Governments, and the many private investigations that are undertaken by Indians and by Europeans.

Besides direct educational work, the chief activities operative towards the raising of standards in industrial areas are legislation, by which those who see injustice and conditions that make for deterioration seek to bring the power of the whole community into play through

Unfortunately many of the films shown in the cinema houses of the cities depict vulgar and rough parodies of western life.

In the Presidency of Bombay several investigators, one of whom is a lady, have been appointed by the Labour Office.

the State; Welfare Work of many kinds, under which may be included all voluntary effort, either on the part of employers or of members of the public, to secure better conditions for the labourers; Trade Unions, by which the workers themselves seek to defend their rights and to secure privileges; and Co-operative Societies, in which members of the labouring community seek to secure their social independence through joint responsibility and mutual trust.

In actual fact the lines are not quite so clearly drawn. Co-operative Societies, for the most part, are inaugurated by the voluntary effort of non-industrials, and are partly dependent for financial support in their earlier stages on Government or on employers. Permanent Trade Unions amongst industrial labourers are organized by outsiders, and are probably in some cases financed from sources other than the wages of the workers. But these headings give a general view of the various lines along which efforts are being made.

See "Welfare Work in Bombay Cotton Mills," by N. M. Joshi, B.A., M.L.A., Journal of Indian Industries and Labour, vol. i, part i, p. 17.

CHAPTER XV

LEGISLATION I

PERHAPS no historical question is fraught with more perplexity than the question of the relation between the intellectual advance of the race and its social conscience. Reference has already been made to the perplexing fact that conquests by the human mind, so great as those involved in the discovery and adaptation of machinery, have been allowed to work much direct and indirect suffering for large numbers of the race. The result of these steps in the progress of man's victory over nature should have been the lightening of labour and the enriching of the world's storehouses at a smaller cost to the workers. Instead, these great achievements, which must yet be made to serve all groups of the human race, have been made the opportunity for exploitation. The gradual and partial awakening of public opinion to this is only beginning to effect an improvement. One of the reasons why civilization has missed its way, not alone in this case, but at other points of advance also, is that life tends to become departmental. As the sense of corporate responsibility quickens, its results are seen in persistent efforts to introduce standards of conduct that are already acknowledged in certain relationships of life, into regions as yet unaffected by them.

Social legislation is one of the lines along which such efforts find expression. Its inception can often be traced

References to regulations not mentioned in this chapter will be found under the subjects with which they deal. The influence in India of the Draft Convention arrived at by Washington Conference 1919, with regard to the conditions of women before and after childbirth is treated in chap. xiii.

See p. 58.

back to the impression made on one person, or on a small group of people, by glaring local evils, but as its history develops in any country, it gains its strength and stability from the individual efforts of employers who go far beyond the limited demands of the legislation of the land in their efforts to secure good conditions for their workpeople. The attempt to make the results of individual initiative available over a wider area gradually arouses public opinion and bands together, in steady co-operation, those who are determined to secure, not only elimination of the worst injustices, but also continued advance towards reasonable conditions.

When a proposed reform comes into the region of legislation, certain things are gained and certain things are lost. Power to influence a large area is gained, and unity of effort. On the other hand, the particular spontaneity and adaptability of private efforts are lost. Legislation must of necessity generalize, and because it does so, and thus gains power to affect large and varied communities, it will almost inevitably tell unfairly in individual cases. There is usually a certain amount of power left in the hands of Local Governments, and of inspectors, to obviate, as far as possible, any injustices that may arise. After making all allowances for the disadvantages that attend its operation, it seems clear that well-considered legislation on social matters tends to secure for an entire industry the conditions worked out by the best employers in it, and that it also enables employers to improve conditions without thereby suffering from unfair competition in particular details on the part of the less scrupulous. And it should never be forgotten that legislation, dull as the subject seems before one enters on its study, is a real method of education to the worker, to the employer, and to the general public. It is with these considerations in mind that the attempt must be made to grasp the significance of factory legislation in India.

The first time that public attention was drawn to the subject in India seems to have been in 1873, when, in a report on the administration of the Bombay

Cotton Department for 1872-3, the writer, Major Moore, dealt with factory conditions in Bombay, and touched especially on the length of the working hours, the conditions of labour of women and children, and the age at which children were employed. Another who co-operated with Major Moore in bringing this subject under discussion was Mr. J. A. Ballard, the Mint Master of Bombay, who, in speaking of the hardships suffered by women and by children under twelve employed in factories, wrote:

They have to work from daylight to dark, and the machinery is kept running the whole seven days for two weeks in the month. The temperature of the rooms is always high, and the long confinement, even with light work, must be very irksome and injurious to young children. The number of spinning mills in Bombay is yearly increasing, and the sooner the question of affording protection to operatives is considered, the more easy will be legislation." It appears that at that time the children began work at six years of age, and worked from sunrise to sunset, with a brief interval of half an hour, and frequently were allowed only two holidays in the month.

The Secretary of State, whose attention had been called to the conditions of labour in India, and who had seen Major Moore's report, wrote on the subject to the Bombay Government, and in 1875 that Government appointed a Commission to determine whether legislation was necessary. On this Commission there were five Englishmen and four Indians; two of the former, however, were unable to act. The decision arrived at by the majority of the remaining seven was against legislation. All the Indian members and one Englishman (the Director of a Spinning and Weaving Company) objected to any kind of interference with industry. The two remaining members, the Collector of Bombay and an English Doctor, held that a simple legislative enactment would be beneficial, both to the factory owners and to the operatives, but strongly urged that such an Act ought to be passed

"Indian Factory Law Administration," by A. G. Clow, I.C.S., Controller, Labour Bureau, Government of India, Bulletins of Indian Industries and Labour, No. 8, p. 2.