Twelve years ago, I visited a medium sized castings company in Coimbatore; it seems though as if it were yesterday. The company had been around for over twenty five years and was owned by one of the largest business groups in South India. Along with my colleague, a hardened finance guy and a number cruncher if there ever was one, I met the CEO of the company. He was a sharp, middle-aged member of the business family, clad in spotless white. The opulence of his office and the car outside indicated clearly enough that he was enormously wealthy.
After the introductions were over, he commenced talking about his company, its financial history, its dominant status in casting components with India’s large automotive companies and of the possible tie-ups with World majors for captive production facilities in India. He spoke eloquently of the significance of India’s low cost of labour and of the shifting of production bases to India to leverage on the country’s intrinsic strengths. We listened attentively and asked a few questions that we believed were relevant to our study of the castings industry. After an hour or so, we evinced a desire to see the unit. He picked up the telephone and asked for the Works Manager who came up in double quick time and stood by my side, head bowed obsequiously. Instructions were passed to take us around.
We went down the stairs and out of the air-conditioned office. A short walk brought us to the foundry, located a hundred yards away. Nothing during the walk prepared us for the sight within.
The foundry shed was a large one, spread out over an acre or more, with a high asbestos ceiling . There was hardly any light inside, except for the flames from the Cuppola furnace at one end of the shed. The temperature inside the shed must have been at least 45 degrees C. I saw a number of men and women engaged in gruelling and highly mechanical tasks, reminiscent of the images of the Industrial Revolution. The foundry had, it seemed, never been modernised. The workers transported molten metal from the furnace, in barrows, to the casting boxes where it was manually poured into the box and then covered with sand, an extraordinarily hazardous task, that would be certain to cause serious injury to a worker at some point of his working life. I saw a couple of men drag a train of casting boxes on wheels along a rail, much like a horse-drawn carriage. Others carried loads of sand on their back. The level of dust was incredible – indeed, the far side of the foundry was a haze.
And then I saw a little girl, probably all of twelve years, stand by the gravity separator. She mechanically unloaded the heavy castings from their boxes and then loaded them onto wheel barrows standing on rails. She should never have been part of this hazardous environment, but then none of them should have been part of this. She saw my obviously shocked face and smiled feebly, yet in her eyes I saw the signs of depredation and despair. My colleague, hardened though he was, stood in silence. He too was watching the little girl. After a while, he walked up to the girl, thrust a twenty rupee note into her hand and walked out of the foundry. I stood around for a little while longer, taking in the details of the foundry with incredulity, and then followed him. His eyes were moist: he was probably thinking of the child he had lost years ago.
Back in the office of the Director, we listened in silence as he continued his talk on the industry. I felt terrible and hollow inside. Now I understood why he didn’t accompany us to the foundry and risk getting his white shirt dirty. Everything that had been said about India’s competitiveness, exports and the low cost of labour seemed to ring empty. His foreign collaborators wanted to come here, because they could avoid the installation of basic systems required to make the workplace habitable. This was not a company built on principles, but one built on exploitation. The pantheon of Gods who lined his walls were mute spectators – their presence there itself was farcical, almost pernicious.
I, as an armchair analyst, would sit in my cushioned office and spout finite wisdom and abstruse financial analysis in my report, probably repeating all that he said dutifully, and exculpating him from any possible charge on the grounds that anyone working in a castings foundry should expect such exploitation. I would argue that the working conditions being inhuman were, in fact, beneficial to profitability and that the continuance of repression meant sustained growth for the company (never mind if none of these workers ever became a shareholder).
Perhaps, in the last decade, some or much of this has changed. Perhaps the implementation of human rights has improved. On the other hand, perhaps it has not. India does not need such foreign exchange, created out of the depletion of human capital and the creation of perdition. India does not need such companies, who will no doubt fail to see the changes in the work order and will fall by the competing wayside.
That day, I felt, for once, that there was something wrong somewhere. How do we change?
After the introductions were over, he commenced talking about his company, its financial history, its dominant status in casting components with India’s large automotive companies and of the possible tie-ups with World majors for captive production facilities in India. He spoke eloquently of the significance of India’s low cost of labour and of the shifting of production bases to India to leverage on the country’s intrinsic strengths. We listened attentively and asked a few questions that we believed were relevant to our study of the castings industry. After an hour or so, we evinced a desire to see the unit. He picked up the telephone and asked for the Works Manager who came up in double quick time and stood by my side, head bowed obsequiously. Instructions were passed to take us around.
We went down the stairs and out of the air-conditioned office. A short walk brought us to the foundry, located a hundred yards away. Nothing during the walk prepared us for the sight within.
The foundry shed was a large one, spread out over an acre or more, with a high asbestos ceiling . There was hardly any light inside, except for the flames from the Cuppola furnace at one end of the shed. The temperature inside the shed must have been at least 45 degrees C. I saw a number of men and women engaged in gruelling and highly mechanical tasks, reminiscent of the images of the Industrial Revolution. The foundry had, it seemed, never been modernised. The workers transported molten metal from the furnace, in barrows, to the casting boxes where it was manually poured into the box and then covered with sand, an extraordinarily hazardous task, that would be certain to cause serious injury to a worker at some point of his working life. I saw a couple of men drag a train of casting boxes on wheels along a rail, much like a horse-drawn carriage. Others carried loads of sand on their back. The level of dust was incredible – indeed, the far side of the foundry was a haze.
And then I saw a little girl, probably all of twelve years, stand by the gravity separator. She mechanically unloaded the heavy castings from their boxes and then loaded them onto wheel barrows standing on rails. She should never have been part of this hazardous environment, but then none of them should have been part of this. She saw my obviously shocked face and smiled feebly, yet in her eyes I saw the signs of depredation and despair. My colleague, hardened though he was, stood in silence. He too was watching the little girl. After a while, he walked up to the girl, thrust a twenty rupee note into her hand and walked out of the foundry. I stood around for a little while longer, taking in the details of the foundry with incredulity, and then followed him. His eyes were moist: he was probably thinking of the child he had lost years ago.
Back in the office of the Director, we listened in silence as he continued his talk on the industry. I felt terrible and hollow inside. Now I understood why he didn’t accompany us to the foundry and risk getting his white shirt dirty. Everything that had been said about India’s competitiveness, exports and the low cost of labour seemed to ring empty. His foreign collaborators wanted to come here, because they could avoid the installation of basic systems required to make the workplace habitable. This was not a company built on principles, but one built on exploitation. The pantheon of Gods who lined his walls were mute spectators – their presence there itself was farcical, almost pernicious.
I, as an armchair analyst, would sit in my cushioned office and spout finite wisdom and abstruse financial analysis in my report, probably repeating all that he said dutifully, and exculpating him from any possible charge on the grounds that anyone working in a castings foundry should expect such exploitation. I would argue that the working conditions being inhuman were, in fact, beneficial to profitability and that the continuance of repression meant sustained growth for the company (never mind if none of these workers ever became a shareholder).
Perhaps, in the last decade, some or much of this has changed. Perhaps the implementation of human rights has improved. On the other hand, perhaps it has not. India does not need such foreign exchange, created out of the depletion of human capital and the creation of perdition. India does not need such companies, who will no doubt fail to see the changes in the work order and will fall by the competing wayside.
That day, I felt, for once, that there was something wrong somewhere. How do we change?
