Industrial Relation in India- A Historical Perspective

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About the Book Our work life constitutes the major working hours of our adult life. It is the human relations, which make our place of work heaven or hell for us. Of all the human relations at work, perhaps the most crucial is the employer - employee relations. This book seeks to uncover the trends of employer-employee relations in India through the historical period of 1940 - 1990, in order to learn from history and intellectuals of yesteryears the nature of this unique relationship as it evolved in India. The book draws out historical content based account of employee relations and enriches indigenous knowledge base 'for academicians and practicing managers.

About the Author Dr. N. U. Khan is a senior faculty member at Department of Social Work, lamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. In addition to his academic credentials, he has made significant contributions to the corporate life of the university. A keen re- searcher, he has been actively involved in planning, implementation and monitoring of various projects of 'SHlKHAR' an NGO working for the empowerment of women. Dr. Khan is also on the panel of National Literacy Mission for the evaluation of various adult literacy programmes implemented in various states and has evaluated literacy programmes in the states of Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Maharastra, Chattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh. An eminent scholar with versatility, he has contributed to enriching knowledge and skill in the disciplines of Social Work and Human Resource Management for both students and practitioners.

Foreword Industrial Relations in India trace its history from pre-independence. In each decade it has been influenced by the State, Employer and Employees; and has exhibited its own flavour. In the first phase, from 1940s of pre-independence to being a new democracy; Dr. N U Khan highlights, State as the major actor and enactment of legislation as a major activity. The second phase, which the author identifies from 1960 to 1980 very aptly describes the discerning features of militant trade unions, industrial conflict and collective bargaining as its peculiarity. Finally, in the last phase the author brings out the influences of the New Economic Policy and its impact on employee relations.

This book draws on vast volume of literature already available in two leading journals i.e. The Indian Journal of Social Work and Indian Journal of Industrial Relations to draw out the historical content based account of employee relations in India. It is pertinent to mention that the articles of a professional Journal record the major issues and concerns of that period and present a contemporary academic account. This book is well researched and brings out trends and concerns of employee relations in India. Only a mature academician and researcher could have undertaken this feat. I congratulate Dr. N U Khan for having contributed to knowledge building of academicians and practitioners (managers and trade unionists) by undertaking this arduous task of providing indigenous literature on employee relations.

Unlike Western analysis of employee relations based on ideological backgrounds, this account takes realities of Indian situation into account by discussing workers and their organization, role of the state, employer organizations, growth of economy and employer-employee relationship. I accord my appreciation to Dr. N U Khan for having enriched indigenous knowledge in Social Work and Management Practice.

Preface The objective of this book on employee relations is basically to provide the students of this discipline, whether they are academicians, managers or trade unionists; an overview of historical development of employee relations in India.

A professional journal's article is an indicator of research productivity in the profession and an important medium of communication for practitioners in a given academic field. A journal is the place where academic community as well as the field practitioners may find updated knowledge considered to be most relevant to the field. The articles published in a professional journal reflect the major concerns and issues at play in the profession. Further, the level of development of knowledge base and practice skill in a profession is determined to a large extent by the quality and theoretical base of articles published in prominent journals of that profession.

This book is based on the articles published in the Indian Journal of Social Work, published by Tata Institute of Social Sciences from Mumbai and Indian Journal of Industrial Relations, published by Sri Ram Centre for Human Recourse Development and Industrial Relations from Delhi. Both these journals are widely referred to by students of social work and management. Hence, it is important to see the trends reflected by them. An attempt to study the trends in employee relations that emerge from the articles on the subject, historically and qualitatively, published in the above-mentioned journals is being done in this book. The trends for the purpose of analysis are seen in the year slabs of 1940 - 1960; 1960 - 1980 and 1980-1990. It is pertinent to mention that during this time period secondary sector dominated the work sphere. Therefore, the nature of employee-employer relationship was addressed to as industrial relations. Keeping this perspective of employee relations in mind, all the articles on industrial relations and allied subjects were selected.

Since the Indian Journal of Industrial Relations started its publications from the middle of 1960s; the first time frame contains the review of articles only from Indian Journal of Social Work.

The total articles published in Indian Journal of Social Work during 1940 - 1990 were 1914, out of which 202 were in the area of issues concerning industrial worker, which is 10.55% of the total articles published, 89 articles were directly related to the area of industrial relations, this is 44.06% of the articles concerning issues related to industrial workers. This shows that high percentage of researchers, in the field of issues related to industrial workers, were concerned with the development of industrial relations in India.

Similarly, in the case of Indian Journal of Industrial Relations, the total number of articles published were 817, out of which 274 were directly related to the field of industrial relations, this comes out to be 33.5% of the total, which again shows that among the authors of this journal, the development of industrial relations in India remained the primary concern. The phase wise descriptions are given in the relevant ·chapters.

Phase - 1 (1940 - 1960): A period generally taken as the beginning phase of Industrial Relations by many authors in the country.

Phase - 2 (1961 - 1980): A period taken as the middle phase of industrial relations in India.

Phase - 3 (Post 1980): A period seen as the turning point in the history of industrial relations in India.

The trends are drawn keeping in mind the objectives and framework of the book, which are summed up on Ideological Background; Trade' Unionism - its growth and development, inter union rivalry, relationship between workers and their organization; Labor legislations and Labor Welfare; Role of state in Industrial Relations i.e. public policy, economic development and labor policy; Employers and their organization, their role and responsibilities; Social work and its role in the development of industrial relations; and Employer - employee relationship.

Introduction The twenty 'first century, is marked by the emergence of India and China as two important economic hubs of the world. Both these highly populated countries have strong agricultural roots. The epochal Endeavour to transform these agricultural economies into modern Industrial economies also impact upon diverse areas of social life in the continent. At the very outset, the process of such transformation is related to the generation and distribution of material wealth in the society and involves a qualitative change from one system of social production to another. Several theoretical underpinnings have been made and continue to be made in this regard (Kumar, 1989). Moreover such systematic changes are also linked to the relocation of the factors of production within a polity. Over and above the economy, the emergence of industrial attributes in a country calls for the transformation of old and at the same time, creation of new social and political 'institutions in society. Such transformation and creation is required partly to cope with the problems of political disquiet and social anomie associated with industrialization; and partly to draw a wide range of social classes into the political and economic decision making, which govern and qualify the emergence of an industrial nation. Last but not the least, the growth of an industrial society calls for changes in the moral order, which informs individuals as well as social classes and provides the ruling elite as well as the popular classes with the poise necessary for a measure of stability in the midst of social and economic change.

This automatically brings into focus the importance of industrial society in general and the significance of the relationship between various players active in the sphere of industry in particular. In order to gain an understanding of changes in a society's social and economic 2 / Industrial Relations in India order it becomes imperative to examine the relations among various stakeholders involved in the maintenance of such an order. In the context of industry this relation is popularly known as industrial relations. It is worthwhile to mention that the pre-liberalized era of economy was dominated by Industries and organized industrial workforce. Therefore, pre- nineties was the era of industrial relations rather than employee relations. The dominant trends of employee relations as defined in the context of a white collared workforce found emergence only post New Economic policy implementation i.e. after 1991. The opening of the economy, abolishment of License Raj and the opening of economy to global and capital market led to the gradual disappearance of industrial relations in the discourse to emergence of two new sub-themes i.e. employee relations and labor relations as different entities. In this work we focus on the pre- liberalized era of industrial relations.

In order to understand industrial relations there is a need to develop a conceptual clarity of the same, which emerges by examining the term itself. The term industrial relations consists of two terms i.e. Industrial and relations.

According to the dictionary of personnel management; "Industrial is an adjective referring to industry which refers to manufacturing work" (Ivanovo and Collin, 1993). Industry includes all factories or companies or processes involved in the manufacturing of products.

The term relations means the relations that exist in the industry between the' employer and his workmen. According to dictionary of Sociology (1988) "This phrase covers the employment relation- ship and the institution associated with it. It embraces the relations between workers, work groups, worker organizations and managers, companies and employer organizations". According to the dictionary of Personnel Management (1993), "industrial relations mean relations between management and workers".

Book's Contents and Sample Pages