Forty Years After

Even as one of the most distinctive aspects of the Great Railway Strike of 1974 was the autonomy of the rank and file, the significance of the struggle had much to do with the nature of the times. The country was in the midst of a general political crisis; even sections of the peasantry were in revolt. Despite these favourable circumstances, and the expression of solidarity from the industrial working class, the National Coordination Committee for Railwaymen's Struggle was not resolute and decisive enough, as much as the situation demanded, and in this respect it failed the rank and file. In the absence of a political vanguard, the uprising was left without a determined subject.