When met him on a sunny afternoon he was sitting in his tobacco shop, dirty grayish blue trouser, almost same colored vest which had holes allover it, he seemed just like any other worker, who had lost his job.
Born in the city where his father came to in his early days and learned the art of tailoring, soon he picked grew up to be a brat in the colony. He completed his graduation from DAV College, and did his diploma in footwear technology. Soon he joined TEFCO. during his TEFCO days he says were very good times, “we had a famous saying that give your foot size at the gate and you wont be able to complete a round of the mill and your shoe will be ready”.
Also there were good canteen systems allover, we use to get enough food at very reasonable price, ” every canteen ELGIN, RESERVE BANK etc had food that even officers ate food there. “Elgin mill canteen served puris and bhaji at 20 paisa. We at sales department often visited canteen. Plays and other events were also organized in the mills campuses. Elgin Mill even had our own library and schools. Post Office and Banks are still part of mill campus.
Almost soaked in nostalgia he says “you can’t even imagine how beautiful the environment was when the mills were run.” After leaving TEFCO he remained unemployed for a year, and from reference of his ‘Nana ji’ (who was labor director at that time), he got a job in Elgin Mill No.1. He joined the mill on 4th may 1987 as a “Management Trainee” and kept working till 1989 until he was suspended from the mill along with many. All those who were suspended, collectively wrote a letter to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Some trainees were called for interviews and only a few resumed their post after a year. Pramod was amongst the lucky ones.
“Working in the mill were very good times”, he says, “problems were there but we were at least able to survive and had some kind of job security”. I had a good post, my rank and carder were ok, I had the opportunity of going to places like Delhi, Bombay, Jaipur and other towns of UP because I was working in the Sales Department. Our job was to supply and collect payments. I can remember when we had this bad phase we visited for advance payments from parties just for paying wages to our labor. We did not have adequate cash. We had a large no. of working staff around 15000 people, when the mill was running at its full capacity, 5000 people were working in every shift.
One more thing that has happened in the city is that films don’t run anymore. Earlier we had money so we could go out and watch a lot of films, now films are just of our reach. Small kids use to sell anything out of cinema halls and use to make a handsome amount at the end of the day, it was a good source of earning for a lot of people. People use to watch films regularly and cinema halls remained houseful through out. Amitabh is his favorite “HERO” he says.
When the shifts ended workers in thousands bicycled towards their colony, the rush was so huge that mills had to change timings of shifts with a half an hour difference, there was no other solution to traffic jams. At a time 30000 people use to travel on their bicycle. Elgin, TEFCO, Victoria, Muir, Powerhouse and all other small n big enterprise employees all had bicycles.
He remembers one night we were working till around 2 in the night and we felt hungry so we just went to the canteen and the person there was sleeping we woke him up and asked him to give us some food, he very kindly made tea and served us pakora’s and other stuff. Very proudly he expresses “this was the level of commitment of the people working in the mills, we were not entitled to get overtime, but not only me, we all use to work for extra hours if it was required by the mill.
“We should not have continued to strike after independence, we did it to the British but we should have not continued that after independence, the better option would have been, we should have worked extra and asked for our desired benefits, it happens in the foreign countries but here it did not happen like this. This policy of strike by the unions hurt the mill worst. When government had decided that it will pay sitting wages, workers should have protested. They thought that we will receive payments without any work and lost their jobs instead”
“Now I do not have enough money. Whatever little I had, I purchased land of it, because that’s the safest investment. I also tried my hand at a “chappal” workshop with two other partner but failed, big fishes don’t allow us to work.” He expresses his concern over his daughter’s education, “both my daughter’s are good at studies but I do not have finances to fund their higher education. My elder daughter wants to pursue MBA as a career but I have to look for bread and butter first I also wanted to get them into BNSD “sikhsha niketan” (good school) but the fees is just out of my reach, they are studying in ordinary Govt. school. I have asked them to study well and do the required hard work, hopefully it will pay. Sometimes I am really frustrated, I cannot even meet their small demands like good clothes and shoes. I have keen interest in painting and writing. But a painting cost over Rs.300, even if I have such spare money someday I will love to buy something for my children.
At 46 he is still running the tobacco shop that caters to the local people but he feels he will soon shift to rural area like Unnao as there is a little less competition. Now he earns 1200-1300 a month as compared to around 3000 in the mill.
Maitrey Bajpai
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