Abstract

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, labour means the general body of wage earners. It is in this sense, for example, that one speaks of organized labour, Section 2, sub section 65 of the Bangladesh Labour Code, 2006 defines a worker as any person including an apprentice, whether his service conditions are expressed or implied, who is employed for skilled, unskilled, physical, technical, business development or clerical job directly in an institute or factory or through a contractor in return of wages or money, but any person responsible mainly for administrative or management functions will not be included. Various factors such as historical, political and economic have shaped the development of labour legislation in Bengal. Labour legislation was introduced in the sub-continent by the British colonizers. Quite often these measures were rooted not in the spirit of benevolence for the colonised, but were a means of regulating them and to protect interests of the coloniser. Industrial workers of Bengal came up generally from the peasantry and weaving class but employers did not afford on the job or off the job training to them to be skilled. Rather they were cheated with absolutely minimum wage and no hidden payroll. They had no fixed working hour; even they were compelled to work from 11-15 hours with no weekend. Moreover they had no legal or administrative support. Employer and the government had ruthless and paternalistic attitude to the workers. In spite of all these odds, industrial growth was very satisfactory on one hand and labour emerged as a class on the other. Those who started their activities as plantation workers, have gradually emerged as a work force contributing a lot to the manufacturing industry without much right attached to them. The evolution of labour as a class with the gradual development of organized sector in Bengal is presented in this paper.