Articles by Santosh Suradkar

The strike of November 1938 was the first time that the untouchable workers, organised under the Independent Labour Party led by B R Ambedkar and the communists, came together to strike against the Industrial Disputes Bill that the Indian National Congress’s provincial government in Bombay Presidency had introduced. The contradictions in the Congress's ideology and practices suggest that the nationalists were not only protecting capitalist class interests, but the ideology also kept changing under the domain of caste and class hegemonic nationalism. By looking at the November 1938 strike and its larger context, the Congress government’s justification and support to the violence on workers under the rubric, their nationalistic agenda is examined.