“My Mother’s Experiences Inspired Me To Research On Tea Plantation Workers”
Najeeb VR’s research is a socio-economic study of the Mappila Muslim tea plantation workers of Kerala’s Wayanad. It explores the history of their migration from various parts of Kerala to Wayanad, the discrimination they had to face, the formation of class consciousness among them and the role their communitarian identity played in this consciousness. Read on to know more about him and his work.
Najeeb VR
Migrants from various parts of Kerala constitute large sections of the population of the state’s Wayanad district, having come here in search of money, land and other socio-political reasons over the years. A region which was part of the Malabar district of Madras Presidency in British India, Wayanad witnessed the formation of a large number of plantations in the first half of the 19th century. Subsequently, studies have shown that during the 1940s, Syrian Christians from southern Kerala and others from the Travancore-Kochi region during the 1960s had moved to Wayanad for agricultural purposes. However, no significant amount of academic literature exists on the migration of the Mappila Muslim community to the tea plantations of Wayanad. My research aims to understand the socio-economic changes in the life of Mappila Muslims working in the tea plantations in Wayanad, Kerala since the 1920s.
Focusing on the changes that have taken place in the socio-economic life of Mappilas in two of Wayanad’s tea plantations — Tatamala and Cherakara — after their migration to the region, my research historically traces the emergence of tea plantations and labour formation here. A major portion of my study discusses the migration and the resultant class formation of Mappila Muslims and also proposes to examine their socio-religious practices in Wayanad.
The study delineates how the restrictions and prohibitions on socio-religious practices led to Mappila mobilisation and also traces the development of trade unions in these plantations, along with critically evaluating contemporary trade union activities. The research gives special attention to women workers in these plantations — primarily their engagement with different arenas of life such as work, household, religion and trade unions. The research also makes an attempt to understand the issues of contemporary plantation workers in the light of their more recent afflictions like neo-liberal economic policies, demonetisation and the crisis unleashed due to floods in the region, while also engaging with the health-related concerns of the plantation workers. As an important part of the study, the question of social mobility of the tea plantation workers are taken into consideration, since three generations of workers are dependent on the tea plantations for their livelihoods.
Being born into the plantations
It was my mother, Ramla, and her life as a tea plantation worker that inspired me the most to research about them in Kerala’s Wayanad district. Her unending stories and experiences, along with my interaction with other tea plantation workers in my hometown, Tatamala, helped me formulate my primary ideas. Nonetheless, it was a challenging task for me to transform the circumstances of my personal life into a subject of academic study. The need to present an unbiased and objective perspective of the workers’ lives was always there, even though my birth and residence in the tea plantations granted me direct access to the field and perhaps a better comprehension of their problems.
My social location — as belonging to a plantation village and having had a long-standing bond with plantation families around me — played a decisive role in helping me carry out the research. Relatives who had migrated from similar native villages and trade union leaders too aided in getting me direct access to plantation workers.
Migration, Class Consciousness and Community: Theoretical Framework
A Marxist understanding of class and its varied interpretations formed the theoretical framework employed in my research. Marx has given a detailed explanation about how economic conditions and the exploitative nature of capital transformed the masses into workers. In the context of Wayanad tea plantations, it is evident that apart from material factors, there were other socio-cultural factors too that contributed to the formation of the working class among Wayanad’s Mappila Muslim tea plantation workers. Multiple-level exploitation, not from plantation managements alone, but from the Kanganis (middlemen) as well, instigated workers to form a collective consciousness to uphold and secure basic rights — including to be allowed to live in plantations — and against oppression.
By using a Marxist framework, my research looks at the evolution of a Mappila Muslim, class conscious working-class in a plantation setting. It critically engages with the classical Marxist understanding of class formations, by looking at how other socio-cultural factors also contributed towards the same. It has attempted to trace how class negotiates with religion, and how these negotiations influence working class formation among Mappila Muslims — which in turn, alters their religious values and customs in the context of tea plantations in Wayanad.
Mappila Muslims cannot be understood as a homogeneous community — class and non-class factors play an important role in the constitution of this community as a heterogeneous one. As a result, class formation is influenced by the values and customs of their community as well. My research has attempted to understand how workers engage in different forms of collective activities, the historical context of how such patterns emerge and it’s political significance in building class solidarity. The pattern of class formation among plantation workers is a complex product of migration, religious practices and emerging class consciousness.
Estates, Life Histories, Archives: Research Method
The first and principal source of this study is the life experiences of the Mappila Muslim workers after their migration to the tea plantations of Tatamala and Cherakara. One year of ethnographic field work was carried out from 2018 July to 2019 July in Tatamala and Cherakara — chosen for their dominant Mappila Muslim workforce, who migrated from different parts of Malabar over years. Participant observation and interview were used as primary tools. A detailed ethnographic study of the two planation villages brrought to light the details of the history of recruitment of tea plantation workers, class formation among Mappila Muslims, the transition of Mappila Muslim women as a dominant workforce, and more importantly, the current state of the workers.
In conjunction with this, the research has also used the life-history approach to understand the social mobility of workers and the archival method to understand the historical formation of tea plantations in Wayanad. The life histories of ten tea plantation workers were collected from both the field sites.
Five archives in different parts of the country were consulted. The major source of information regarding the recruitment of Mappila Muslims to the tea plantations was collected from the regional archives in Calicut, Kerala. Several related documents such as Census Handbook of Malabar, Village Statistics of Malabar district, Statistical Atlas, Statement of Population of Wayanad taluk, in each village of Malabar, which was arranged according to occupation etc., were also collected. They helped in understanding the history of the emergence of tea plantations and labour recruitment into them.
The biography of tea planters in Wayanad, colonial documents, and statistical data on workers were collected to understand the historical context of the recruitment of Mappila workers and the role of the Kanganis in this recruitment process. Planters Chronicles and Planters Opinion were also collected. Besides all of this, plantation-related books and documents were surveyed from digital archives.
Five months were spent in each village and two months in different archives.
Findings of the Research
My research argues that Mappila Muslim migration to Wayanad occurred in three phases.
1) Before the Malabar rebellion (1921), primarily for the purpose of timber trade
2) Mainly to the tea plantations of Wayanad, took place after 1921 as a result of the Malabar Rebellion
3) Between 1940 and 1975, when Mappila Muslim families migrated to different parts of the tea plantations of Wayanad
The main reasons for the migration were poverty, unemployment and the social atmosphere created after the Malabar Rebellion. Prior to the 1921 rebellion, they relied on agriculture and coastal trade for their livelihood. However, after the rebellion, the Mappila Muslims lost their influence in the agricultural and coastal trade because of the upper caste Hindus and the elites. Most Mappila Muslims began migrating to different parts of Wayanad to ensure safe jobs in the plantations.
The Mappila Muslim Kanganis, who benefited from colonial plantations, played a crucial in the process of migration. Prior to 1921, Mappila Muslims who had migrated for timber trade were appointed as Kanganis by the British. In the plantations, Mappila Muslims were employed both as Kanganis and labourers. Interestingly, people hailing from the same community occupied two different levels of authority within the same economic setting. It is important to note that while the early-migrant Mappila Muslims became economically prosperous and became Kanganis, the Mappila Muslims who migrated in the second phase became part of the labouring class for generations. Therefore, migration of the same community created an affluent class as well as a working class of Mappilas.
The Kanganis made workers a part of the plantation by offering them attractive benefits such as regular employment, housing, permission to return home once a year and the opportunity to receive liquid money in hand. The Mappila identity of the Kanganis played a crucial role in bringing labourers to tea plantations. Moreover, their experiences in the native hometown made it easier for the Kanganis to lure the workers.
Historically analysing Mappila Muslim migration however, we understand that workers were subjected to unavoidable exploitation and discrimination. By uncovering a permanent labour force in Mappila Muslims, tea plantation management was able to run planations without any difficulty and gained sufficient money out of it. Kanganis played a significant role in making the Mappila Muslim bonded labourers. The emergence of Kanganis as an affluent class also is the result of the unparalleled exploitation endured by the Mappila labour force.
The study found out that in the early period the workers organised themselves in a strategic manner through creative interventions. Trade union cadres were formed via reading clubs, football clubs, etc. As the union began to intervene publicly in the plantation affairs, militant agitations against the management were carried out. The union began to function as a public forum for workers to present their problems to and a platform to work together to claim their rights. The union was able to intervene and ensure fair wages and other benefits, and intercede in the social lives of the workers. The trade union became a part and parcel of the everyday lives of the plantation workers as they organised religious programmes, weddings, celebrations of any kind, etc. It played a significant to role in transforming religious ceremonies held at the plantations villages like the nercha, mawlid prophet’s birthday celebrations (in the case of the Muslim workers) etc. into a common public programme, where people belonging to any faith could participate. As food was an integral part of such religious gatherings, non-Muslim workers also participated in them. Such social gatherings, in the form of religious ceremonies, became a platform for trade unions to interact and engage with the workers and to propagate their ideas.
Najeeb VR submitted his PhD dissertation in December 2020. He was part of the Centre for the Study of Social Systems (CSSS) at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi.
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