Indian Industry

The question is often asked; what is an Indian industry? It is asked generally regarding Indian exhibitions. Formerly, t is used to be claimed that any industry that was conducted in India was an Indian industry. Thus, a mill manned by non-domiciled Europeans bringing capital, skilled man-power and machinery from abroad was considered to be an Indian industry, even though it could be proved to be harmful to the masses. From that we have traveled a long distance. An industry to be Indian must be demonstrably in the interest of the masses. It must be manned by the Indians, both skilled and unskilled. Its capital and machinery should be Indian, and the labour employed should have a living wage and be comfortably housed, while the welfare of the children of the laborers should be guaranteed by the employers. This is an ideal definition.

Congress Definition

But between that definition and the one that was the vogue even with the Congress before 1920, there are many shades of definitions. The Congress definition has generally been all goods other than mil cloth manufactures in India. The great mill industry may generally be claimed to be an Indian industry. But in spite of its ability to compete with Japan and Lancashire, it is an industry that exploits the masses and deepens their poverty in exact proportions to its success over Khadi. In the modern craze for wholesale industrialization, my presentation has been questioned, if not brushed aside. It has been contended that the growing poverty of the masses, due to the progress of industrialization, is inevitable, and should, therefore, be suffered. I do not consider the evil to be inevitable, let alone to be suffered. The A.I. S.A. -1 has successfully demonstrated the possibility of the villages manufacturing the whole of the cloth requirement of India, simply by the employing the leisure hours of the nation in spinning and the anterior processes. The difficulty lies in weaning nation from the use of mill cloth. This is not the place to discuss how it can be done. My purpose in this note was to give my definition of Indian industry in terms of the millions of villagers, and my reasons for that definition. And it should be plain to everyone that national exhibitions should only be for those industries which need public support in every way, not those which are flourishing without the aid of exhibitions and the like, and which organize their own exhibitions.

1. All India Village Industries Association.

Harijan: Oct. 23, 1937.