Conducts research and collects data on the global history of labour, workers, and labour relations

Posthumous Promotion

12 January 1915
Military Hospital in France, 1915, from the National Museum of Health and Medicine Collection
Source: 
http://flickr.com/photos/99129398@N00

Different forms of work make up the practice of war, one in which actual combat is only the most spectacular. In the British army in India, it was native Indian labour which did the menial work of various regiments, such as lavatory cleansing, water carrying et cetera. These Indian ancilliary services and menial followers were transplanted to Europe during World War I. An untouchable, Sukha Kalloo,  a latrine sweeper at the Hospital for Indians from the Expeditionary Force in France, died on January 12th, 1915. He was buried in the christian churchyard at Brockenhurst.  Sukha's epitaph reads: '...he left country, home and friends to save our King and Empire in the Great European War as a humble servant...By creed he was not Christian, but his earthly life was sacrificed in the interest of others'

Radhika Singha, 'Front Lines and Status Lines: Sepoy and Menial in the Great War'  in: The World in World Wars (Leiden 2010)