A Nuanced History of Madras' Working Class

The little-known history of the first organised labour unions of India, formed between 1918 and 1939, and the role they played in the formation of a working-class consciousness and the struggle for Independence are vividly described in The Making of the Madras Working Class by Dilip Veeraraghavan. This book was first written as a dissertation titled “The Rise and Growth of the Labour Movement in the City of Madras and Its Environs, 1918-1939” by Veeraraghavan, who submitted it to the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras in 1987.

Published posthumously, it is a meticulous historical account of the period and is an inspiration to students of history, as well as visually disabled students.