The recent remarks by Larsen & Toubro chairman S.N. Subrahmanyan, suggesting employees should work 90 hours a week without taking Sundays off, have sparked outrage across the country. But what many people may not realize is that the concept of a weekly off in India was not handed down easily — it was earned after a long and relentless struggle by workers in the country’s first industrial town.

Mumbai, during the British Raj, was rapidly transforming into the epicenter of India’s industrial revolution. The cotton boom between 1861 and 1865 created unprecedented demand. With the American Civil War cutting off cotton supplies to England, Indian cotton became a lifeline for British mills. In 1860, India exported 422,000 cotton bales to England. By 1866, this figure had skyrocketed to 1.6 million bales.

As trade flourished, Mumbai’s first cotton mill was established on July 11, 1851, by Kasavji Davar and 50 other businessmen who pooled ₹5 lakh to start the venture. Within a decade, cotton mills mushroomed across Mumbai, drawing thousands of workers from rural India.

Rural Migration to Mumbai  

The situation took a drastic turn during the severe droughts of 1871-72 and 1876-77. Rural distress triggered a massive migration to Mumbai. By 1871, over 8,000 workers were employed in 10 mills. Over the next 25 years, this figure swelled to 78,000 workers in 71 mills.

But life for these workers was anything but easy. Factory Inspector Reports from the period reveal a grim picture: workers toiled for over 15 hours a day without lunch breaks, often eating while working on the factory floor. The mills were congested, poorly ventilated, and suffocating.

The call for better working conditions began to take shape in 1884. Inspired by the social revolutionary Mahatma Jotiba Phule, a mill worker and activist named Narayan Meghaji Lokhande founded the Bombay Mill Hands Association. For the first time, workers gathered to voice their demands, and among the key demands was the right to a weekly off.

Weekly Off Demand

Mill owners were outraged. Mumbai-based researcher and activist Manohar Kadam, who documented the workers’ movement writes that the millers dismissed the demand, arguing that workers already took time off during festivals and that women took leave during their menstrual periods. “Why should they need a weekly holiday?” they asked.

But the workers’ determination did not waver. They continued their meetings, rallies, and petitions, demanding a fixed day of rest every week.

Finally, on June 10, 1890, history was made. The Mill Owners Association, after persistent pressure from the workers since 1978, conceded to their demands. The weekly off on Sundays was officially granted — marking a pivotal moment in India’s labor rights movement.

Today, as corporate leaders debate over working hours and productivity, the story of Mumbai’s mill workers is a stark reminder that the right to rest was won through grit, sacrifice, and struggle. The weekly off that many take for granted today is not merely a perk but a hard-fought right carved out of India’s turbulent labor history.