The Archives of Indian Labour is a unique digital project initiated at the V.V. Giri National Labour Institute, in collaboration with the Association of Indian Labour Historians (AILH). The archive, which aspires to be the prime repository of labour related records in the country, was designed and instituted to address the urgent need for preservation of rapidly decaying documents and material on labour.

The archive, apart from being a repository of sources and documents, builds collections and initiates research in the field of labour history. The collections are generated through projects commissioned at the programme and institutional documents donated by various organisations. Documents related to labour movement (generated by workers’ organisations, state and business enterprises) are preserved at the archive, in addition to personal narratives and memories of leaders of Indian labour movement and workers.

The other unique feature of this archive is the integration of historical and contemporary records. Organised around special collections, it provides historical depth to contemporary issues and situates historical changes from a contemporary perspective. The archive also assumes importance due to its emphasis on informal sector labour.The technical specialty of the Archives of Indian Labour is its stress on digital storage and retrieval of material. This is the first fully digital archive in the country. The digital mode was opted considering its advantages in terms of financial & spatial economies, durability of storage, and improved access to material.

The Archive is an Integrated Multimedia Storage and Retrieval System, which enables to store records and material in different media formats- such as text, audio, video and digital- and provide access to these through an integrated delivery system. The organisation of material and its delivery are realised through a open source code software, Greenstone, developed by New Zealand Digital Library. The software is customised considering the requirements of the archive in a user-friendly manner. The system is designed to enable fast and meaningful delivery of documents through different access modes- such as offline networked PCs, CDs, and the World Wide Web.

The web site of the Archives of Indian Labour (www.indialabourarchives.org) was formally inaugurated by Shri Sharad Yadav, Hon’ble Union Labour Minister, on May 1, 2002, the International Labour Day. With this, a much wider public now have access to the information gathered at the archive.

The materials, which are now available on World Wide Web, amounts to 7 Giga Bytes, comprising of 8 major collections (nearly 50,000 printed pages; and 100 hours of taped interviews). These collections include records and reports of all the Commissions of Labour from 1931 till 1991 (including the complete collection on the First National Commission on Labour, 1969); records and publications of central trade unions such as AITUC, BMS, CITU and INTUC; records and reports on the unorganized sector labour movement in regional centres. A large number of interviews of workers and labour activists and documents of labour movement in the informal sector can also be accessed. Apart from this, a detailed inventory of material and sources on labour history and write ups on technical aspects of digital archiving are available in the web site.

The search facility instituted to the web site enables greater access directly to the documents right to the level of page, section, word or a tagged audio and video clip. It also allows non-linear search across collections. By default, the search facility is across all the collections and user has the option of setting preferences for particular collections(s). The navigation of the web site is made simple through a write up that provides instructions for using the help menu.

Brief descriptions are given on every collection explaining the source, contents and its structure. Each of the collections comprises of various sections that classify the documents thematically at the sub-collection level. The sub-collection is further divided into individual physical documents. Depending on its nature, the document could be navigated at different levels.

Visit us: www.indialabourarchives.org