Page:Labour in Madras.djvu/204

talistic exploitation, in the name of growing Indian Industries, has already taken place, and that ought not to be permitted any longer. The welfare of the Indian labourer should not be sacrificed for the sake of “growing industries" ; the betterment of his lot should not be relegated to a second place, and a primary position given to the improvement and growth of young or new industries. HOURS. The last inquiry into factory conditions in India was conducted in 1908, as a result of which the Factories Act was amended in 1911. That Act is now in force. The Report of the Indian Factory Labour Commission admits that “in textile factories excessive hours are frequently worked in cotton mills: in all jute mills weavers are employed for excessive hours,” and it makes mention of seventeen ard eighteen hours a day in ginning factories (P. 82): twenty to twenty-two hours in rice and flour mills (P. 82), the textile factories of Bombay working “ for fourteen hours or more" (P. 82), those in Ahmedabad and Broach working in summer for fourteen hours and more (P. 80), mills in Agra working fifteen and a quarter hours per day in summer, and thirteen and three-quarter hours in winter (P.82), factories in Delhi working "fourteen, and even fourteen and a half hours ” (P.82). What was the out-come of the Report ? The Act was amended, and now “no person shall be employed, in any textile factory for more than twelve hours in any one day"(Indian Factories Act, Chap. V., para. 28). A textile factory can employ a labourer for twelve hours per day for six days of the week, 1.6., seventytwo hours per week. What is the recess in this twelve hours working-day? The Act provides that half-an-hour's