Social security and mutual assistance in India: A preliminary account

This paper describes workers’mutual benefit and welfare arrangements in late colonial India, concentrating on the Calcutta and Bombay areas. The meaning and specificities of informal, non‐governmental social security and insurance for industrial labour are explained in relation to the prevailing social situation. A descriptive account of the few known instances of efforts made by sections of the working classes to organize mutual assistance or benefits, and of the more numerous attempts made from time to time by philanthropists and social reformers to provide labour with social security in the virtual absence of formal organizations for mutual benefits, brings out some of the limitations of such efforts. The role of trade unions in relation to labour welfare is considered. Explanations of the weaknesses of the various arrangements are given. A preliminary analysis of the informal mechanisms for the provision of social security, insurance and mutual assistance in the absence of government support and employer provision and of formal mutual benefit and friendly societies is followed by concluding comments.