The Indian mines maternity benefit question, 1919-47.

Abstract

Although women constituted a significant part of the total labour force in the mines of India, yet till the end of the First World War very little was done to promote their health and welfare. In the absence of welfare legislation and voluntary work, women faced serious hardship and privation especially during the period of their confinement. Not only were they not paid any wages for the period of their absence, in some cases they lost their jobs and incurred heavy debts to defray the expenses of this critical period of their lives. The International Labour Organisation, founded at the end of World War I to secure and maintain fair and humane conditions for labour, in their very first conference held at Washington in 1919 recommended to its member states, including India, the necessity of providing adequate maternity benefit to their female labour employed in the industrial establishments. The main provisions of the draft convention (stipulated in articles 3 and 4) were: (a) rest periods of six weeks before and after confinement; (b) sufficient maintenance for the mother and child including the provision of free attendance by a doctor or a midwife; (c) an allowance of half-an-hour twice daily for nursing the child; and (d) security against dismissal on account of absence due to confinement. Ever since the adoption of this convention at Washington, the question of maternity benefit had become a subject of debate and discussion in India both inside and outside the legislature. As it is not possible to study in detail all aspects of the issue in such a short paper, we intend to limit ourselves to certain aspects of it. Section I examines the working of voluntary maternity benefit schemes in the British Indian mines. Section II deals with the enactment of the Indian Mines Maternity Benefit Act, 1941, which was put in the statute book 'to regulate the employment of women in mines for a certain period before and after childbirth and to provide for payment of maternity benefit to them'. It also critically examines the main provisions of the Act. Section III is a study of the working of the Act.