The World's First "Bhaiyas" Were the British By Manu Kant

 

The World's First "Bhaiyas" Were the British

By Manu Kant

“The English working-man is, in law and in fact, the slave of the property-holding class, so effectually a slave that he is sold like a piece of goods, rises and falls in value like a commodity.” — Frederick Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England (1845)

The recent rape and murder of a 5-year-old boy near Hoshiarpur by a migrant worker from Uttar Pradesh has reopened painful wounds and raised harsh questions about the morality of migrant workers from Bihar and UP. In Punjab, these workers are often known as "bhaiyas," a local colloquialism that carries a complex mix of begrudging recognition for their labor and social marginalization. This term, while affectionate to some, is frequently used in derogatory tones to mark them as outsiders and social inferiors.

To understand why such scapegoating occurs, and what it reveals about society, we must look deeper into the conditions endured by these migrants. History teaches us a valuable lesson, especially through the work of Frederick Engels, whose seminal 1845 book, The Condition of the Working Class in England, studied the lives of workers during the first Industrial Revolution. Engels described a working class trapped in grinding poverty, degraded labor, and social exclusion—a precursor to the modern "bhaiya" experience in India.

Engels observed that industrial capitalism had converted workers into mere commodities: "The worker of today seems to be free because he is not sold once for all, but piecemeal by the day, the week, the year... he is the slave of no particular person, but of the whole property-holding class." These workers, uprooted from rural life and forced into burgeoning industrial cities, faced overcrowded, filthy slums, brutal working hours, and wages barely sufficient for survival. Their lives were marked by poor nutrition, disease, and desperate circumstances that eroded social and moral structures.

Much like the migrants from Bihar and UP, the British industrial proletariat were displaced and often reviled as outsiders. Engels recounts how these workers were lumped together as a dangerous underclass blamed for crime and moral decay, much as "bhaiyas" today are in Punjab. While the term "bhaiya" is a culturally specific label unique to North India, the social phenomenon it represents—the mass displacement, economic exploitation, and systemic scapegoating of a migrant underclass—first occurred on a modern, industrial scale not in Punjab, but in the factories of Britain.

The term lumpenisation describes how precarious economic conditions push such workers further to the margins. Reduced to informal, insecure labor, bereft of social protections, and separated from traditional family and community bonds, lumpenised workers lose touch with the social mores that usually govern behavior and reinforce mutual responsibilities. Living in overcrowded dormitories or slums, far from their villages, cut off from stable family structures, these workers often suffer alienation, despair, and social dislocation.

Engels pointed out that under such harsh conditions, the degradation is not merely physical but deeply moral and cultural. Families are broken, domestic violence and alcoholism rise, and survival often demands desperate, even criminal acts. Far from being innately immoral, these behaviors reflect the brutal realities these workers face daily.

In Punjab, the migrant "bhaiya" must be understood as a modern equivalent of Engels’ industrial proletariat—essential to the economy, yet excluded and scapegoated. Their labor sustains the state’s fields, industries, and services, yet they remain second-class citizens, denied adequate housing, healthcare, and social inclusion.

The tragedy at Hoshiarpur demands justice and accountability, but it also calls for deeper reflection. Blaming and barring entire communities only perpetuates social fracture. The real enemy is the systemic neglect and economic exploitation that creates these vulnerabilities. Only by addressing the root causes—providing dignified work, housing, education, and social integration—can society hope to heal these fractures.

As Engels concluded, the working class "must strive to escape from this brutalising condition, to secure for themselves a better, more human position." What he described as the plight of the first industrial workers is today lived by millions of migrant laborers in India. Recognizing the legacy of exploitation and dehumanization embodied in the term "bhaiya" allows us to see the urgent need for social reforms that restore dignity and community to all workers, no matter their origins.

The world's first "bhaiyas" were indeed the British industrial workers, displaced and degraded by capitalism’s rise. Their history is a mirror for the struggles faced by migrant workers in Punjab and beyond—an enduring call for justice, solidarity, and systemic change.