The All India Trade Union Congress, established in 1920, emerged as India’s first central trade union to safeguard workers’ rights and advance socio-economic justice.

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• The All India Trade Union Congress was founded in 1920 at Bombay under the presidency of Lala Lajpat Rai to represent India at the International Labour Organization.

• The creation of the International Labour Organization in 1919 encouraged Indian leaders to establish a central trade union body to safeguard workers’ socio-economic interests.

• Prominent leaders including Motilal Nehru, Annie Besant, C.F. Andrews, B.P. Wadia and N.M. Joshi participated in strengthening AITUC as a national labour platform.

• Its objectives included uniting workers, ensuring fair wages, humane working hours, safe conditions, elimination of child labour and protection of women workers’ rights.

• AITUC also advocated social justice, national independence, economic equality and worker participation in management decisions within a broader socialist framework.

• The first major split occurred in 1929 over support for the Royal Commission on Labour, leading moderates to form the Indian Trade Union Federation.

• A second split in 1931 led to the formation of the Red Trade Union Congress by communists amid ideological differences within the organisation.

• After independence, the trade union movement fragmented along political lines, resulting in separate union centres affiliated with different political parties.