Opinion | Kerala Held Hostage: The Politics Of Shutdowns

The real measure of political maturity is not how efficiently one can paralyse a state, but how well one can negotiate justice without holding society hostage

The nationwide strike announced by the trade unions generally went off without incident across the country on February 12.

Although many trade unions and labourers participated in the strike, it had no major impact on normal life in most of the states. Two states, however, were particularly affected by the shutdown: Odisha and Kerala. In Odisha, in addition to the nationwide strike, a few unions had called for a 12-hour bandh, which was supported by the opposition. This affected Odisha. This was to be expected, given the additional 12-hour bandh.

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The second state that was affected by the shutdown was Kerala. There was no bandh or hartal in addition to the shutdown in Kerala. The unions and the leftist factions knew well that announcing a shutdown with the support of leftist parties would bring life to a standstill in the state. In fact, Elamaram Kareem, a trade unionist and CPI(M) leader in the state, had boasted the day before the shutdown that they would bring the state to a standstill and that the shutdown would be a huge success in Kerala.

Kerala has long been notorious for such shutdowns. Before the mid-1990s, bandhs and the commotion they caused were widespread in the state. Most people opposed the idea of a total shutdown enforced by party thugs, but had little choice. The menace became so severe that, in 1997, a full bench of the Kerala High Court banned bandhs in the state, declaring them “illegal and unconstitutional". This brought relief, but only temporarily. Soon, hartals were announced, which in practice often amounted to total shutdowns, effectively bandhs under another name. Political parties, and even organisations with very little public support, could declare a hartal and, inevitably, many people, afraid of attacks on their vehicles or physical confrontation, would stay indoors. The organisation calling the hartal would then tout this as a victory, presenting it as evidence of public support. Hartals were so pervasive in Kerala that 120 hartals took place in 2017. In 2018, 98 hartals were held, 12 of them in the month of April alone.

An interesting hartal that was not declared by any organisation also took place in Kerala in 2018. Out of nowhere, a few people launched a campaign via WhatsApp, claiming that a hartal would be observed on the 16th of April, 2018. According to the messages, this was in protest against the Kathua rape case and the incidents that followed. Although the police confirmed that no organisation had called for the flash hartal (funnily enough, many referred to it as a “fake hartal"), the denial was feeble. On the day, there was indeed a hartal. Public life was disrupted, and in some places it even turned violent when people tried to open shops or go about their daily routines.

In 2019, the Kerala High Court banned flash hartals in Kerala and mandated that any hartal must be planned in advance, with a seven-day notice required. The court also held that political parties or individuals calling for flash hartals would be responsible for losses caused to the government and citizens if adequate notice was not given. This drastically reduced the number of hartals in the state: in 2019, the number fell to 12 from 98 the previous year. Although the number of hartals was reduced after interventions by the court, any declaration for a hartal means a complete shutdown of the state, with party henchmen ruling the streets, disrupting transport, shutting down shops, and threatening those who want to go to work. With little interest in the losses such shutdowns might incur to the exchequer, and with no concern for the terrible wounds that the thuggery inflicts upon the public, shutdowns are declared. And with a curious and depraved pride that trade unionists boast of ‘bringing the state to a standstill’.

Even though public sentiment is largely against them, how and why trade unionists can so easily threaten an entire society and bring it to a standstill is something we should examine. It is amply clear that, apart from leftist trade unionists, no one is interested in such total shutdowns. Although these one-day shutdowns have been observed over the past few years, often ostentatiously as protests against the policies of the central government, even the protestors themselves would agree that nothing substantial has been achieved through them in these years. Yet each shutdown is enthusiastically projected as a victory for the trade unions. In Kerala, the glory of such a “victory" is measured by how completely the unionists can bring the state to a halt.

One of the most basic tenets of politics concerns the relationship between rights and duties. Citizenship involves both rights and duties. Political philosophy has long emphasised that rights are not free-standing entitlements but are structurally tied to duties. As one contemporary philosopher puts it, “Rights entail corresponding negative duties not to violate those rights… Yet, in our non-ideal world, these negative duties and thereby persons’ rights are pervasively violated." It is strange and ironic that, in protests ostensibly intended to establish or re-establish rights (in the case of the 12 February shutdown, the rights of workers), duties are neglected and the rights of the public at large are disregarded.

It was Mahatma Gandhi who argued that the true source of rights is duty, and that if people discharge their duties, rights will naturally follow. Interestingly, this reciprocity between rights and duties was never a concern among the trade unionists of Kerala.

The practice of nokku kooli, or “wages for watching," in which headload workers demand payment for loading or unloading work even when they have not done it, and sometimes even when the work is done by the owner, employees, or machines, is rampant in Kerala. It is a predatory form of extortion that many firms are forced to fight against. Though blatantly illegal, senior leftist politicians shamelessly justify the practice, arguing that workers are right in demanding such “wages".

Their justification? As a society, we failed to consider the jobs of headload workers being lost due to mechanisation or alternative arrangements, and it is therefore the duty of society to compensate for this job loss.

Last week, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on the floor of Parliament that investment is not flowing into Kerala. She also said that economies have suffered wherever Communists have been in power. The Finance Minister pointed to the case of the Kitex Group, which had to leave Kerala despite an investment of ₹3,500 crore. One reason for this deplorable state of affairs is undoubtedly the free hand trade unionists enjoy in the state when it comes to goondaism, from nokku kooli to threats on the days of shutdowns.

In the new world order, such shutdowns and forms of labour protest, inspired by or envisaged in the writings of Karl Marx during the Industrial Revolution, are largely irrelevant. Any agitation in which the rights of the public are disregarded, daily life is disrupted, and citizens are threatened will be seen as a major red flag by investors. Intimidation and extortion such as nokku kooli, too, will not be taken lightly. Of course, for a limited period, reality can be covered up with large PR exercises, as the Kerala government is doing now. But ultimately, the state will suffer.

Ultimately, Kerala’s problem is not protest itself, but the coercive culture that has grown around it; one that confuses intimidation with legitimacy and disruption with democratic strength. A society cannot claim to fight for workers’ rights while routinely trampling on the rights of ordinary citizens to move freely, earn a living, and live without fear. Nor can a state hope to attract investment while normalising shutdowns, extortionary practices, and street-level enforcement by political loyalists.

If trade unions wish to remain relevant in a changing economy, they must reclaim moral authority through responsibility, not muscle.

The real measure of political maturity is not how efficiently one can paralyse a state, but how well one can negotiate justice without holding society hostage.

The writer is a commentator with a research degree in philosophy from the University of Sheffield, focusing on the intersections of culture, history, and politics. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.

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