'Asian women picketing outside Grunwick. Jayaben Desai (right). Photo: Phil McCowan
Forty years ago in 1976 a group of workers, predominantly South Asian women, led some of the biggest mobilisations the labour movement has ever seen in Britain. A small factory, the Grunwick photo processing plant situated in a residential backstreet in Willesden, north west-London, became the focus for trade union activity which put South Asian women centre-stage for the first time.
Although rather patronisingly dubbed “Strikers in Saris” by the press who liked to emphasise the exotic novelty of Asian women on picket lines, the images of the strike remain undeniably powerful and have served as an inspiration to generations of Asian women who came after them.
