On living in the kal(i)yug: Notes from Nagda, Madhya Pradesh

Nagda in Madhya Pradesh is the site of a large viscose rayon factory employ ing significant numbers of workers from surrounding villages. pollution and health and safety issues in and around the factory have been key concerns for several decades and this, combined with the continuous shift system and division of labour embodies industry as the apparently (negative) antithes is of the rural. This is certainly the perspective of local high-caste vill age employers who articulate a very negative view of the factory, seeking t o project it as parr of the degenerate kaliyug which is associated with mac hinery, the goddess Kali, and a dangerous and unstable modernity. Local vil lage-resident factory workers, however value the comparatively high industr ial wages, shorter working hours, and their liberation from the oppressive expectations of rural 'patronage'. The complex everyday predicaments of liv ing in the kaliyug are explored through a variety of different voices which suggest the inadequacy of trans-local narratives of industrialisation.