Ceylon

“To facilitate the smooth running of the plantations, the employers evolved the notorious kangani system.

This served the twin functions of recruitment of fresh labour and the retention of the workers on the estates.

The kangani system was essentially patriarchal [and founded on casteist/caste-based labour] and took into consideration the immediate economic and social circumstances of the immigrants leaving their villages in India. The recruiting agent was called the kangani - a significant term in Tamil, meaning, one who keeps an eye on the labourers. Under this system the planter advanced a sum of money and sent a trusted worker with a dominant personality to India.

The kangani went to his village and got down to the task of recruiting labour for his employer in Ceylon. He painted a rosy picture of wealth and prosperity that awaited them in the plantations. These honeyed words kindled great hopes in the hearts of the poor peasants who were ground down by an inhuman system of land tenure imposed by British Rule. Here was a chance, they imagined, to earn enough to pay off the taxes, redeem their mortgaged small holdings or to buy plots of land for farming.

The kangani advanced sufficient money to prospective immigrants to clear their outstanding debts. The recruits therefore became obliged to the kangani but then they hoped to clear the debt to the kangani and return to their homes with some savings. "Every cooly, it will therefore be seen, begins his life in Ceylon more or less in debt." The kangani brought rice and food-stuffs for the recruits and "looked after them" throughout the journey to the estate. He rarely spent enough on the basic requirements of his recruits.

In order to satisfy his employer's urgent need for labour and, in an effort to save as much money as possible for himself, the kangani pressed on the immigrants to proceed as fast as they possibly could. This led to great distress among them, and those who could not keep pace with the main gang were left behind. The sick and the starved often died on the road. It was years later that cooly patrols were engaged to pick up the sick and the exhausted and clear the road of the corpses if they had been spared by vultures and jackals.

Under the kangani system the worker did not quit the estate for three main reasons. Firstly, he was indebted to the kangani and, therefore, to the estate. Secondly, he felt obliged to the kangani for the opportunity afforded him to better his prospects. And thirdly, no planter would employ him without reference to his previous employer. The kangani himself was not free since he too was indebted and obliged to the employer for the privileges he enjoyed. This kind of chain slavery helped the plantations run smoothly.

An immigrant worker who desired to leave an estate due to unbearable conditions or because of better prospects elsewhere could do so only through the medium known as the 'tundu.' A 'tundu' was a written statement by an employer that he was prepared to discharge a worker on payment. On the 'tundu' being accepted by another employer and the debt discharged the worker is transferred from one estate to another.

There were two classes of kanganies; the head kangani and the "sillarai" or kangani. The former had many gangs of workers, each of which was under a sub-kangani. Since the employers were obsessed with a fear of a shortage of labour, they did not pay a proper wage to the kanganies. The head kangani was paid only a token salary, and his main income was dependent upon the total number of heads that turned up for work. He was paid "head money" that is 1 1/2 to 2 cents per head per day for every worker that worked. The sub-kangani received in addition to his "name" - a day's pay - what is called "pence money" at the rate of 3 to 4 cents a day for every worker of his gang, who turned out to work.

This was an ideal system of engaging labour as far as the plantation interests were concerned. It had a distinct advantage over the indenture system which was in vogue in the case of many British colonies other than Sri Lanka and Malaya, which drew upon the Indian labour market. Unlike the Indenture system where "the employer was under legal obligation to provide fixed wages, free housing, medical attendance and other amenities," the indentured labourer was bound to serve his master for a fixed time expired. In the Kangani system there was no such apparent danger to the worker's freedom. Yet, as previously mentioned, the workers were tethered to the estate by less visible means.

The Ceylon planters could also absolve themselves of all direct responsibility for the welfare of the workers; it was the kangani's business, they pretended, since they were "his men." Such an impression was cast in the public mind, that for all the appalling misery and death amongst the plantation workers, the accusing finger would be directed at the kangani and not the planter. It is for these substantial advantages that the employers in Ceylon preferred the kangani system to all other modes of recruiting and retaining labour.”

-A History of the Up-Country Tamil People of Sri Lanka, S. Nadesan