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Women's participation in trade union movements

The Struggle Continues ... (Women's leadership in Plantation trade Unions in Sri Lanka)

Author: Menaha Vijayaluxmy Kandasamy

Veeramma was the Women's Wing leader of the Trade Union in X state. She was appointed to the position by the Estate Committee which was simultaneously formed when the trade union was established. The Women's Society, known as Mathar Sangam was also formed at the same time.

Veeramma was not a 'raw' estate worker she had been in the field for some years, and had her Trade Union leadership training for women conducted by an NGO, and was very much involved in leading estate worker women.

She had an issue, of course not of her own, but of the fellow workers. Some workers, majority of them women had been kept as casual labourers by the estate management for several years.

Veeramma was initiative to take the issue to the notice of the male leader 'Thalaiva', of the Union. She asked him to take up the matter with the estate management. Though the leader promised her to do so, the problem remained unresolved. Then she herself took the matter to the Branch Trade Union.

The branch representative too promised her that the problem would be solved within a few weeks. Even after a lapse of three months the issue remained unresolved. Veeramma then went and met the regional trade union officer, and conveyed the problem and the history of it - how the problem changed hands from one leader to another.

After a few weeks of her meeting with the regional trade union officer, Veeramma was summoned by the estate trade union leader and conveyed that he had received a letter from the regional trade union officer asking him to sack Veeramma from the position of Mathar Sangam leader. Now, Veeramma is back in square one, - an ordinary worker in the estate.

What went wrong with Veeramma? She disregarded the trade union culture in the estates, which is patriarchal both in form and in content. And, her enthusiasm in trade union activities, and the spirit of solidarity with the fellow female workers would have made her disregard the fact that women's leadership was a non issue in the estate trade union set up.

The above episode of Veeramma conveys the gist of the book's theme - the women's oppression in the estate trade union movement in Sri Lanka.

The book, though not voluminous, is a path breaking study not only of the women in trade union movement in the plantations but the status of plantation women workers' lives in general.

Tea cultivation needed a permanent workforce and women were considered to be more suitable for plucking the tea bud because, their nimble fingers would not harm the bud. Thus when the male labourers were brought from India, women too followed them. As the tea industry expanded rapidly migrating numbers too went up.

Thus, in 1877 a total number of 48,786 women have arrived, almost a double increase than in 1876, whereas the number of male migrants have slightly gone down i.e. In 1876, the number of male migrants was 121,743, while in 1877 it has gone down to 106,796.

These women were brought for several purposes - to toil in the plantations, serve the sexual needs of male workers, and reproduce the workforce.

The writer exposes the travails of the estate woman worker graphically, supported by research based data, awakening the reader to the harrowing realities of their lives. A worker has to report for work by 7.00 a.m. Being a few minutes late, she is not given work, and is chased away by the field officer or the supervisor.

The tea-break is at 10.00 am and for fifteen minutes. Mothers with sucklings are given half-an-hour for feeding. The second quota of plucking will start after fifteen minutes and goes on till 12.00 noon, 11.45 am for feeding mothers. Then they have to carry the buds to the weighing centre. After her load is recorded she goes and picks the kids from the creche, goes home, prepares food for the family, and by 1.00 pm returns to work. In the afternoon, the work goes on till 4.00 p.m. Then they carry plucked leaves to the weighing centre which is sometimes 2 to 3 kilometres away.

One kilogramme is taken away for the weight of the basket. If it is the rainy season, another 2 kgs for the moisture in the leaves. If a worker has plucked less than 18 kgs she will be noted as having worked half day. Though the wage is calculated in a daily basis, payments are made monthly.

Although it is considered to be an equal wage for both men and women, it is not so as women work two and half hours more than men. Men's work is over by two p.m. Women's salary too is collected by man, her husband, as women have no time to collect salary since they have to rush back to attend to household tasks.

Though Sunday and full moon days are holidays women work in the estate on these days too as they are offered one and half day's salary for those days.

Depiction of a day in the life of an estate woman worker sets the backdrop for the more finer elaborations of a woman's place in the tea estate as her workplace and more precisely in the estate trade union movement.

She deals with the issue of women's role in the trade unions and attempts to identify the causes for the non-existence of women's leadership in the plantation trade union movement in the country.

The study specifically deals with the women's leadership, rather the lack of it in the plantation trade unions, and how women's subordination is further reinforced through the unions. It traces the root causes for the gap in women' leadership, evolution of trade union activities since colonial times, and the attitude of workers to women's leadership.

A laudable attempt to identify the connection between the trade union structures and patriarchy, this study identifies the key patriarchal links that impact on women's leadership in the trade union movement, and recommends a set of guidelines, that paves the way for gaining women's effective leadership in the estate trade union movement. A useful book for any trade unionist or women's activist, who are committed to see women's leadership in trade union movement.

The writer, Menaka Kandasamy, daughter of a pioneer militant trade union leader, has captured the issue of plantation women in estate trade unions and presented in such an interesting manner that it becomes a cry of freedom of those toiling women among tea bushes in the hill country.

- Malini Govinnage

Reminiscence from a well-stocked memory

Bradman Yugaya (Bradman Era)
Author; Premasara Epasinghe
Publisher: Sarasavi Publishers, Nugegoda.
Review by Edwin Ariyadasa

The English word "Serendipity" implies the pleasant and fortunate capacity to discover happy things, even when you are not looking for them. This expression has a particular aptness for Sri Lanka, as this faculty was initially associated with the fairy tale titled "The Three Princes of Serendib (Sri Lanka)"

Premasara Epasinghe's latest cricket book "Bradman Era" provides a nine of pleasant surprises to the reader, making him serendipitous.

When you take up Premasara Epasinghe's work, you expect invariably to be informed about the cricketing colossus Don Bradman. But, the author overwhelms you with a whole plethora of cricket love, while admirably profiting the central character of his book - Don Bradman.

The book, written primarily in Sinhala, has a bilingual urge to it. Essential issues are presented in both languages.

As an experienced and esteemed cricket commentator, Premasara Epasinghe is endowed with a exceptional, efficiency in arresting and holding the attention of his listeners and readers. In his prefatory auto-biographical note, he reminisces alluringly about his early preoccupation with cricket.

While only a tiny tot, he spent endless hours, bouncing a soft-ball off the wall of his house. Unfortunately for him, once the ball landed in the curry-pot in his mother's kitchen. Taking a stern view of his mischief, father thrashed him. Mother's attempts at rescuing their only child proved fruitless. Father ended up chasing young Premasara round "College House," which incidentally was his childhood home.

With all that, he was doted upon as an only child. The author fills his work with a substantial quantum of information relating to many aspects of cricket. Drawing upon his well-stocked memory, Author Epasinghe recounts the history of several fields of activity, that have to do with cricket. He positions the profile of the cricketing giant, in the context of Australia's history and traces the annals of Sri Lanka - Australian cricketing links.

He makes the intriguing statement, that the only occasion Don Bradman was dismissed "hit-wicket", occurred in Sri Lanka.

His book is replete with details and statistics, that endow an encyclopedic quality on the work.

He narrates the story of Don Bradman with an almost breathless enthusiasm, unabashedly displaying his unqualified admiration of the Great Man.

Cricket, as things are, is largely a matter of records, scores and personalities. Premasara Epasinghe, has amassed a whole series of facts and figures, to quench the thirst of cricket-fans for that kind of material. By giving a permanent place to fugitive bits of information relating to cricket, he has made his book an indispensable work of reference to those interested in this global game.

Premasara has dutifully paid his tribute to those outstanding personalities in the field of cricket in Sri Lanka. Don Bradman's contemporaries, who formed the galaxy in which Don was the unassailed 'star', have been given their befitting niche in the work. In the latter half of the book, as segment of the vast array of compliments Premasara received over the years, for his professionalism and his personality, is presented and with a praiseworthy sense of humility. Sam Wijesinha, prominent in a multiplicity of fields in Sri Lanka, compliments Premasara and his objectivity.

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