Angels are turning red: Nurses' strikes in Kerala

Abstract

The nurses' strikes indicated the outburst of the self-concealed and politically ignored labour's unrest in the hospital industry. It is the beginning of a different form of class struggle, a demand for a more adaptive and communicative strategy from the established trade unions and the political left. This article looks at the labour-capital conflicts in Kerala's hospital industry, class formation and unionisation of nurses and the approach of political parties and the government to the question of labour.