Twenty-five years later, flyovers, swank malls, skyscrapers and five star hotels have sprung up all over the area. Only a few silent chimneys and shut mills are a reminder of Mumbai's industrial past.
After Dr Samant called the strike, the workers stood rock solid behind him thinking things would change for the better. However, things went from bad to worse.
Anaji Sambhaji Pawle, another mill worker who participated in the 1982 strike, notes, "I never came out of debt after the strike. I took one loan after another loan to make two ends meet. I thought the management would give up and bow to our demands but that never happened. I think the period between January 1982 and January 1983 was the worst of my life. I curse myself, all workers and Dr Datta Samant who brought so much misery to us."
After the strike completed a year, Dr Samant told the workers to continue the strike and that led to withering away of the workers movement.
"I could be out of work any longer," says Govind Tushaba Dalvi, another former mill worker. "I decided to go back to work and accept the management's demands. Like me, thousands of workers decided to do the same."
"The word strike fills me with fear," says Pandurang Salvi. "Like me all workers have accepted the reality that managements, politicians all make money and it is only the workers who suffer. Everybody made money out of us. We were the only ones who got nothing."
The workers who returned to work got neither decent increments nor bonuses.
"We were like outcastes," recalls Pawle, "A stigma was attached to our names forever."
Image: Five star hotels contribute to the changing demographic of the area
Also see: Chronicle of mill murders not foretold
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