Migrant Labour and Textile Industries: Who Gains In The Process Of Labour Mobility

Abstract:

Globalization process in the Asia and let alone in the Globe opened up frontiers of new employment avenues for labor mobility. The present paper deals with the mobility of Odia laborers migrating to the textile Industries of Surat. This mobility reflects upon the mobility of labor from a backward economy of eastern part of India to a developed industrial economy of western part of India.. Odias were known as good gardeners. Gujarati merchants in the British Colony of Mauritius lifted a few Odias to work as gardeners in their posh bungalows at home land at Surat. Odia gardeners  after staying a couple of years in the city of Surat could visualize the prospect of their employment in the textile  industries and gradually invited their kith and kins to engage themselves in the different sections of Jobs offered by the textile industries. The data reveals the fact that during seventies hardly a couple of Odia laborers migrated to Surat to work in the textile industries. The recent census figure reveals the fact that around twelve lakhs Odia migrant laborers work in the textile industries of Surat. Majority of them are youth and highly educated. In this process of labor mobility kinship relation play a vital role. These laborers work for twelve hours per day with no paid holiday. Employment condition is purely temporary with no provision of insurance. Majority of them, live in the slums with a life full of miseries and agony. It is strongly believed in labor mobility theory that migrants used to send money to their home places in turn which brings prosperity and change in the home economy and change in the life style of migrant family. Our observations substantially do not support the dominant theory of socio-economic change.