SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The thesis is a study of the nature of the political system in Ahmedabad City during the 1960s and early 1970s. It looks at the interaction between the institutional and agitational modes which characterize political behaviour in the City, and examines the ability of the political system to cope with the challenges of rapid urbanization and large-scale migration. Chapter I introduces the themes of the thesis; Chapter II describes the unique historical evolution of Ahmedabad City and gives a socio-economic profile of the City. Chapter III outlines the functions and powers of the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation in the context of considerable State Government control. Chapter IV examines the unique role played by the business community in the political life of Ahmedabad City in collaboration with the Gandhian-inspired Majur Mahajan (Ahmedabad Textile Labour Association), as exemplified in the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation between 1961 and 1965, when business-labour political relationships paralleled model employer-employee relationships in the economic sphere. Chapter V examines State-Local political linkages and their impact on city developments. Chapter VI looks at agitational politics through the career of the Janta Parishad, which broadened from a party of linguistic agitation in the 1950s to a party embracing economic agitation centred on the textile workers' dearness allowance issue in the 1960s. Chapter VII analyses the difficulties of sustained mobilization, party maintenance and goal attainment experienced by the Janta Parishad in its period of power in the Corporation from 1965 to 1969. Chapter VIII studies anomic agitation as exemplified in the City's Communal Riots of 1969. Chapter IX looks at State-Local linkages after the Congress split of 1969. Chapter X draws together the various strands of the thesis.