Shankar Guha Niyogi : A Politics in Red and Green

Excellent -  very clear, very readable - the life of a remarkable trade union leader.  For nearly 20 years, Shankar Guha Niyogi led steelworkers and miners in a way that united them, local farmers, and the landless across India's social divisions and showed them how to draw on their considerable knowledge both technical and agricultural to improve very destructive industries, which therefore caused far less pollution, employed more people, and were more productive.  This is an inspiring example of how to do Red-Green politics, and of how serious environmentalism must involve major reforms of our modes of production. That won't be easy; as Niyogi lay asleep in his union office, he was shot dead. The killer got a life sentence, but the industrialists who had hired him were acquitted.  As Ramachandra Guha says, they hated Niyogi for 'giving workers self-respect and the belief that they could be equal citizens of the land'.

Reviewed by Arvind Sivaramakrishnan from the Book Buying Group.