[Reader-list] Metro construction

[hpp at vsnl.com]

Dear Friends

The posts on the metro brought to mind an investigation I had conducted in
1984-85, together with my friend and fellow-activist, Sandip Bandopadhyay,
on the working conditions of labourers on the Calcutta metro.

In late 1984, I had approached the public sector construction company
working on the Park Street section of the Calcutta metro, to allow me to
start a school for the children of the workers' settlement there. The
workers were predominantly from the Chota Nagpur region, and for a long
time, a small adivasi village of these workers existed beside the water body
at the Park Street - Chowringhee junction. Near where the Gandhi statue
earlier stood, before it was shifted (in the early 80s) to Mayo Road during
the metro construction.

My application to start a school went unheeded, and a few weks later, the
settlement was demolished in early 1985. That promopted Sandip and me to
begin our investigation. Our findings were subsequently published as reports
in the EPW, and a booklet, "Calcutta's Metro Workers", was published by us
in the name of the Association for Protection of Democratic Rights (APDR).

We found that all the labour laws, provisions of Contract Workers' Act,
Equal Remineration Act etc were being habitually violated on the metro
works. Bonded labour from Murshidabad district were also at work on some
stretches. Workers suffering injuries were paid nominal amounts and packed
off. There were incidents of rape of women workers. But all this was simply
accepted by everyone concerned.

One section of the metro, between Shyambazar and Belgachia, ran under the
canal there. Hence the construction technique used elsewhere, the "cut and
cover" method, could not be used. "Shield tunnelling" was taken up. An
underground tunnel was bored, and the tunnel walls then supported by steel
shields. Then compressed air was filled in the tunnel to prevent the earth
below the canal from collapsing. Hence the work inside the tunnel was under
compressed air. It was found that this had significant health impacts on the
workers. That too was not attended to. I will not forget my visit to the
compressed air tunnel, arranged by the workers' union.

In 1985, based on our reports, a citizens' group filed a public interest
litigation on violation of labour laws in the Calcutta High Court, naming
the construction companies and the Railways as respondents. The court
appointed a study team to investigate the matter. Several months later, the
team submitted a report to the court expressing their frustration regarding
lack of cooperation from the respondents, and asserting that the problems
were systemic and hardly likley to be solved through expostulation and such
litigations. That was the end of that.

Meanwhile, I had become involved with the question of squatters in the city,
their evictions and campaigning for their resettlement. But among other 
things, in the course of the metro investigation - with which my life of public 
activism in my city began - I had the opportunity of working with towering people like 
Biren Roy, a veteran trade union leader and leftist figure of the city, who was 
the working president of the APDR. I also met Pasupati Prasad Mahato,
anthropologist; we have been lifelong friends and comrades in several important
transformative ventures.

I hope young activists in Delhi and Bangalore will monitor the working 
conditions of metro labourers in these cities.

Best

V Ramaswamy
Calcutta
cuckooscall.blogspot.com