INTRODUCTION
The re-e ergence of working class action in South Africa following the Durban strikes of 1973/74 and the subsequent growth of independent non-racial and Black 1 trades unions in this country has prompted "the need for a reassessment of our view of the working class, their life, their culture and their organisations" (Vawda, 1984, p, 117). It is precisely this need which stimulated our interest in examining the emergence of an Indian working class and its representative organs in Durban between 1930 and 1950. For the forces that leu to the proletarianization of Indians and the emergence of a trades union movement and tradition yet been adequately documented or of South African labour history.