256 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
reason why the coal cutters preferred to quit the mines in favour of the other employment on the surface was because the coal cutter could take his wife along with him and get her earnings added to his own and thus increase the family earnings. If he worked in the mines he could not benefit of her earnings because of the ban. This was probably the greatest inducement which the coal cutter had in order to quit the mine and seek alternative employments that were within his reach.
Now, I have no doubt that nothing else would have helped to bring back the coal cutter except to allow his wife the opportunity to work with him and earn a wage. In my judgment nothing else could have enabled us to retrieve the position and get back the coal cutter into the coal mine, we have been told that we could have got back labour to the coal mines by increasing wages. On this point what I would like to say is this, that this is an argument which within limits has its force but that when carried to extremes turns out to be worse than useless. My friend Mr. Joshi yesterday referred to the fact that they paid enormous wages to coal miners in England and that it was the best paid industry. Undoubtedly so. But Mr. Joshi forgot the fact that even in England where they pay such enormous wages to the coal miners, there has been an enormous shortage of labour available for coal mines. Therefore, Sir, the point is this, that wages could not be that sovereign remedy which it has been suggested to be. In our judgment, and I think it was a correct judgment, the only method of retrieving a very bad and a very serious situation was to take the decision that we have taken.
There is another point which is urged against the decision the Government has taken. I should like to meet this point quite squarely because it is an important point the force of which I confess I have always felt-namely, that there is shortage of coal in England and in other countries but there women are not allowed to work underground, why should then we allow women to work underground in India ? Now, Sir, the answer to that is two-fold. In the first place in other countries like England, where women are not allowed to work underground, they have the alternative remedy of conscription. They can compel people and they do compel people to go and work in coal mines. I have very