| Labour Law: Employment and Resistance in Post-Colonial India

How does this course relate to the programme curriculum: Does it develop on a prior course in the programme or is it a foundational or standalone course?

Course develops on the existing courses on labour law which introduce the guiding principles of labour legislations. This course will contribute towards the students’ knowledge of labour law by examining conceptualization and implementation of legislations in Post-Colonial India. Beginning with how did the Indian government dealt with the question of labour and their rights in the new elected democracy and workers’ responses through their forms of mobilization to represent their demands. The course will continue to study the challenges in implementing legislation by examining the everyday negotiations between the state and citizens within a democratic nation. The mechanisms of governance through legislations and judiciary become the sites of contestations offering insights into legal and extra-legal practices of the post- independence years. The primary actor government, and citizens embolden with Constitutional rights engage with rule of law and create possibilities for transgressions. With secondary readings and case studies the course dwells into the potentialities and limitations of legislations in India.

Describe how you have approached the course. What have you included/excluded and why? Choice of materials: primary or secondary readings / case law;

I propose a course to study the role of law in India’s nation making process. The aftermath of the Second World War and transfer of power was marked by a crisis of unemployment, labour unrest, and declining industrial productivity. The official circles reposed their faith in law and implemented legislations to curb labour unrest. Legislations proposed to offer a solution by delineating rights and responsibilities of each actor; state, capital and labour. An examination of these legislation in action will reveal the extent to which law could serve the purpose of containing discontent and disruptions.

The implementation of these legislations produced a heavy volume of disputes between labour and capital which form a thus far underexplored archival source. As citizens of independent India employers and workers were emboldened to raise their demands and contestations through specialized tribunals and labour courts. They invoked the rights guaranteed under the constitution to secure their demands in the trials. Case proceedings offer insights into multivarious demands, the nature of investigation, type of evidence, and final awards of these disputes. By examining these proceedings, we will understand the function and role of law in everyday lives of the citizens. The debates and deliberations in the proceedings will enrich our knowledge of how judges decide disputes; Did the judges interpret justice according to the guiding principles of democracy and socialism in independent India? Was case precedence from the colonial past or Britain contributing towards dispute resolution? Whether the language of law was inclusive of social identities such as caste and gender to encourage participation and representation across communities?

The course will historically contextualize and examine the role of law in navigating these challenges. The official focus will be countered with voices from below to learn how the citizens could move the legislations to address their concerns, and how they navigated the judiciary to settle the disputes.

Describe your pedagogical method: lectures, Socratic discussion, seminar style discussion, response papers or group work, field work;

The pedagogical methods will initially include lectures and group work to invigorate and maintain students’ interest and participation. The classroom discussions will be substantiated with group work through role play as students take the role of legislators, adjudicators, and aggrieved parties to discuss case studies. Over the weeks there will be individual presentations on key themes followed with socratic dialogue among the students. The dialogues will enable them to reflect on the language of the judgements, the concept of justice raised through them, means or tools prescribed to achieve them. The discussions will encourage students to articulate their perspectives and responses to determining factors in final awards and their impact on the nation. These methods will develop critical thinking and peer learning by enabling communication. Weekly presentations and assignments will help them develop their tools for expression and writing.

Describe the layout of the course: module structure and sequence.

The course begins by historically exploring the need, meaning and implications of legislation to formalize the conditions of work and delineating the responsibilities, obligations, and rights of each party. Each set of rules produced the possibilities to circumvent them by extra legal forms of coercion for employers and resistance for workers. The course will historically map the conceptualization and working of law with the new national government. The readings draw from Indian experiences, offer insights into how the citizens of independent India could represent their demands and contest their everyday injustices.

In the following weeks case studies and readings will focus on disputes arising from these legislations and how they were contested in the courts. The discussions will take up the role of lawyer, acts invoked, nature of evidence in the case proceedings and final awards. Moving beyond the conventional sites of work the course will turn to globalization and privatization of production. The Indian labour market opened to foreign investments and workers were gradually connected through global supply chains. The readings will examine the significance and implications of these shifts and if there were revisions to legislations accommodating new mechanisms for seeking justice. In the concluding weeks I will focus on the continuities and similarities in the forms of resistance, and nature of disputes to foreground interconnections amongst expectations of the state, organization of production, reliance on law, and resistance from workers. How does the working of law help us understand the role and contributions of legislations in a society? In what ways global economic linkages impact the legislations for labour relations? How do the legislations and subsequent proceedings visualize citizens; as contributors to the national goals of production or as individuals protected through law. Whether there is disjuncture between these two approaches and if so, how are they addressed and resolved.

Sessions will follow a multidisciplinary approach and include readings from sociology, gender studies, urban studies, legal studies, economic, development studies and anthropological studies.