Diwan Chaman Lall


Diwan Chaman Lall was an Indian politician and diplomat who served as a Member of the Rajya Sabha.

Biography

Chaman Lall was born on 30 October 1892 to Dewan Bahadur Daulat Rai. He received an honors degree in jurisprudence from Jesus College, Oxford, later called to the bar at Middle Temple in London. He worked a journalist, first for the art and literature quarterly magazine Coterie, in London, then as editor and Chief Leader Writer for the newspaper The Bombay Chronicle.
Lall was a founder and first general secretary of the All India Trade Union Congress in 1920, later becoming its President in 1927. He established himself as a leader of workers' unions, serving as president of the Federation of Posts and Telegraphs Union, All India telegraph Workmen's Union, All India Postal and R.M.S. Union, All India Press Workers' Union, NWFP Railway Workmen's Union and the EP Railway Union. Lall was a member of the Royal Commission on Labour in India during 1929–30. He recommended that the working hours of industrial workers be reduced and that minimum age for employment at factories be raised to 13 years. He also suggested that the government take steps towards it in conformity with the 1921 Convention that dealt with the same. He represented workers' interests at the first Round Table Conference in 1930–31. Lall served as delegate at the International Labour Organization conference in Geneva and led India's delegation at the 1946 Montreal Conference.
As politician, Lall served as a member of the Central Legislative Assembly first from 1924 to 1931, and then between 1944 and 1946. From 1937 to 1945, he served as member of the Punjab Legislative Assembly. In 1946, Lall became a member of the Constituent Assembly of India before he resigned in two years later. He later served as India's Ambassador to Turkey from 1949 to 1950, and then as member of the Rajya Sabha in the 1950s and 1960s. He married Dr. Helen Khan and had three children with her; sons Prakash, Navin Prakash and Rahul.