Voices of Protest: Abolition of the Indenture Labor System

• ANJALI TIWARI

  University of Lucknow

The Indian National Movement was one of the multi-dimensional nationalist movements. It attempted to address almost all the major challenges that were affecting Indians. The indentured labour system was one such aspect that was finally abolished due to the efforts of our leaders. In this paper, primary sources from archives, speeches, and secondary sources have been used. This paper aims to understand the abolition of the indentured system from a gendered perspective. As Indian independence was not the effort of a single individual, the abolition of the Indenture was also a collective effort at multiple levels and platforms like newspapers, pamphlets, legislation, and active resistance to the system. The abolition of the Indentured system was achieved in a non-violent way. The campaign against the Indenture system was intensified by the letters, poems, pamphlets, and Reports mentioning the atrocities against Indians in these colonies. Individual experiences of Indentured Indians also gave a push to this anti-colonial campaign. The second part looks at how nationalist leaders like Gandhiji, Malviya, Gokhale, Sarojini Naidu, Annie Besant, and other women leaders approached the issue. The abolition of the system was, apart from other unjust aspects, over the issue of women’s honour and sense of humiliation and derogation aspect over the term coolie for Indians in foreign countries.

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