A faked business processes offshoring (BPO) company took money for employment from some students in NOIDA. When the students noticed the scam they did not allow the company owners to move out the building till they paid them back.
Greater Noida on 10th of January 2010
Over eight students suffered minor injuries in a clash with the police personnel at Knowledge Park-I late last night. The students were protesting against a BPO company company.
“A company at Sector Alpha had hired some management students from a college. The students had joined on January 1. Later, they alleged that the company was fake. It had allegedly demanded their salaries as security. Last evening, the company owners and students held discussion for settlement on the college premises. The students said they would not allow the company owners to move out till they cleared their payments. A woman company owner called the police in the meantime saying that she was held captive by the students. The police had to use mild force to disperse the agitating students and take the owners out,” said a police superintendent.
Medical superintendent of the Kailash Hospital Sannil Kapoor said, “Over eight students had come with minor injuries.” The students alleged that the police was helping the company and ignoring their complaints. They said instead of talking to the college administration, the policemen took the company owners to hostel and assaulted the students with sticks. “I was standing at the gate when some policemen assaulted me with sticks. I suffered injury on the leg.” said a first year student.
Comments
students who have nothing to
students who have nothing to sell but their labour power
These are "management"
These are "management" trainees - and anyway, "student" is not a category of class anymore than schoolkid or infant. And those in higher education in India will in large majority be from the middle/upper classes - with such education completely inaccessible to the poor majority. But if you subscribe to a 2-class theory then such subtleties will pass you by...
Edit; the article hardly describes a "riot", contrary to the sensationalist headline.
Quote: These are
on what basis are you making that claim?
Most BPO workers around Gurgaon are call centre workers on ridiculously long hours, with very low pay by Western standards.
correct - no-one has claimed that it is, so I'm not sure why you are saying that.
would it be as good an education as available to even the poorest working class person here in the UK? So what is the relevance?
I have openly said on here that you can define more classes of people if you want, especially the concept of a middle-class can be useful in aiding understanding of events. But I do think that yes, all proletarians are exploited by capital and so have a shared common class interest.
well that something to take up with the Gurgaon workers news people then. However, I would think that they would be in a better position to understand the events than us, as they live there and wrote the article.
Ret wrote: These are
Ret
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article
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Ret
Then I'm not sure why the article heading says "proletarian students".
Ret
Er, yes of course it would - they do have universities in India. (And not all the working class in the UK can access higher education.) There are, eg, lots of highly skilled IT workers in India - there are, eg, bankers, financiers, doctors, lawyers etc. The middle and upper classes pay for private education, education abroad etc. - and relative access to educational opportunity is a major (if not near absolute) demarcation between working and middle class in India.
"The relevance" is their position within the class relations of Indian society. It's the norm, eg, for the Indian middle class to have servants;
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An article on a gated middle class community - in Gurgaon, no less;
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Steven
No-one has claimed otherwise, so I'm not sure why you are saying that. ;) The issue is whether all so exploited are proletarian. Some at least of those professionals in those gated communities with servants from the slums are technically "exploited by capital" in the process of maintaining their middle class status.
Steven
While I'm sure they're familiar with the place, I'm not sure if the English/German publishers/translators live there. Anyway, while I don't doubt their integrity, one might still be able to disagree with somebody's analysis of a particular society - even if they live there. (The info in the story is scant anyway, so maybe I've/we've misinterpreted.) But it's not as if all UK posters on here even agree with class descriptions of UK society. I certainly wouldn't recommend some of those descriptions to outsiders.
Quote: Ret wrote: These
I think there is a difference between management students and management trainees. You can do degrees in business management, but that does not by any means lead to you becoming
a manager.
in that phrase "proletarian" is the category of class. "Student" is a description of their educational status. So it could equally said "proletarian school students" or
"proletarian cricket fans" - the "proletarian" is the class category, it wouldn't be implying that all students or all cricket fans were proletarian.
As you will know, 46% of the population here do attend university. Furthermore, University here is more accessible to many poorer working class people than more middle-class
ones, due to the means testing fees. Children of parents not earning very much don't have to pay fees.
these students are clearly not having private education abroad, because they are students in India.
I'm not sure of the exact details, but in any case I would think that my assumption, that most working class people in the UK would have access to a significantly higher standard
of education than middle-class people in India. Having a quick look online would seem to add weight to my argument, with figures like 57% of college professors in India not
having masters degrees or PhD's for example (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_India)
If they are in a situation where they are desperate enough to pay a dodgy employment agency money to try to get a job, it doesn't seem like they are particularly well off.
Either way, I'm not sure what the relevance is. I think basically you either support what these workers did - taking direct action to try to get their money back off a criminal
employment agency, or you don't. Do you? if so, I'm not sure what your general point is?
without any definition of what "middle class" means in those articles I'm not sure of the relevance to this event. Like I said, I can't imagine superrich people with servants
would be paying fake employment agencies to get work.
of course. All proletarians in this country for example are exploited by capital but maintain a "middle-class status" on a global level, as even the poorest level of workers is
much better off than most people on the planet.
I made that comment because you stated that my "two class analysis" was insufficient. But you have not stated an actual disagreement with my analysis.
Like I said above, I think the point is more do you support people taking collective direct action against their position as proletarians, against their dispossession. And I
would say that in pretty much all cases (unless they are part of the violent repressive arm of the state) you do. Quite a few of the Tower Hamlets College strikers probably had
cleaners in their houses; to me this makes no difference to whether I support their strike or not.
information in the article is scant, yes so it's difficult to see exactly what went on. But I would assume that the authors would have access to more information that we wouldn't. The English speaking publisher is a call centre worker in Gurgaon, yes.
steven wrote: I think there
steven
It's hardly unreasonable to think that management students are management trainees, but yes it may not be uniformly true.
No, but I expect it often shows a desire to become one - or to get a job producing management ideology; efficiency studies, HR techniques, all the mechanics of exploitation etc.
Yes, but there's a difference in this context between saying 'proletarian cricket fans' and 'proletarian office workers'. It's not clear if they're labelled proletarian cos they're students doing a temp job (in which case I wouldn't call them proletarian - lots of posh students do that) or cos of their class background/reality.
It doesn't mean they've never done so or never will - the point is class decides such opportunities.
Depends what you mean by "access". Most working class in the UK will never have much chance to become, eg, doctors - that's a given before they're born.
It may not be so much of a career neccessity in India to get such qualifications. I'm not sure that means the education is 'worse' at that level. But I don't know.
If they're middle class kids who got ripped off of some potential extra pocket money I'll have less sympathy than if they are struggling proletarians totally dependent on the income. You don't appear to see the distinction as important. Most future capitalists and captains of industry go through the academic mill nowadays - particularly in business studies, presumably - so, no, I wouldn't be dumb enough to consider them proles just cos someone rips them off on a holiday job.
Not "superrich people with servants" - middle class people with servants from the vast shanty town across the road. It seems Mr Chand was some kind of 'management student'. As the article describes them;
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Class is a relation within class society - who we directly struggle with in those relations is immediately and primarily within the social structure of 'our' nation states. The idea that in the West we're all middle class globally is 3rd worldism, conflating categories like that doesn't have much practical sense; in reality the working class - though having similar function - has attained thru struggle varying levels of material abundance within different societies. Similarly for the middle class - similar function, varying levels of material reward. (Though in India the caste system makes things more complex.)
And he may see things more like you - and I would still disagree for much the same reasons.