Who Is Responsible for Maternity Benefit State, Capital or Husband-Bombay Assembly Debates on Maternity Benefit Bill, 1929

State, Capital or Husband?
Bombay Assembly Debates on Maternity Benefit Bill, 1929 Amrita Chhachhi The discussions on the Bombay Maternity Benefit Bill, 1929, have focused so far on the needs of capital, and left unexplored the role and needs of the colonial state as well as the reconstitution of patriarchy within the working class family and the sphere of wage-work. This paper, by focusing on Bombay legislative assembly debates over the maternity benefit bill in 1929, seeks to highlight these other untouched discourses, such as on nationalism, on ideology of protection entailed in the legal rights for women workers, on construction of working class by upper and middle class perception, and on the disciplinary aspects of legal regulation. The paper also aims to being back into contemporary discussions the central issues about who should hear the cost of reproduction - the state, capital or husband?