The strike lasted from 29 June – 2 August 1928, and severely affected the transportation of people and goods across South India.
At about the same time, the management of the South Indian Railway Company decided to lay off over 3,100 workers to compensate for the purchase of costly machinery in the workshops at Podanur, Negapatam and Trichinopoly.
[2] Supporters of the strike have, however, claimed that cost-cut was mainly an excuse and that the real reason for the layoffs was to get rid of extremist elements in the railway union.
On 29 June 1928, about 8,000 workers in the South Indian Railway workshops in Negapatam, Trichinopoly and Podanur struck work.
The strike also encountered opposition from some of the union leaders, too, notable among them being S. V. Aiyar, editor of the Indian Railway Magazine and President of the Madras and Southern Mahratta Railway Employees Union and Ernest Kirk, General Secretary of the Madras Labour Union who commented I am not against a strike, but if initiated and rushed and wire-pulled by adherents of Moscow it is severely handicapped from the outsetThe striking workers responded by accusing them of "betraying the interests of the workers" and "working against the Central Committee."
At a meeting in Trichinopoly on 1 July 1928, Mukundlal Sircar, Secretary of the All India Labour Union, blamed British imperialism for widespread unemployment in India and exhorted railway workers to join hands with the Indian National Congress and participate in the Indian Independence Movement.
There were clashes between railway workers and policemen in Tuticorin and Mayavaram in which a striker was killed in police firing and 63 others were arrested.
The strike, however, continued in Trichinopoly and Madura till 30 July 1928, when Krishnamachari, the Secretary of the South Indian Railway Workers' Union, and Pillai, treasurer of the South Indian Railway Local Labour Union, issued a statement formally calling off the strike We have demonstrated to the public our capacity for organisation and concerted action .
relying on the justice of our cause we are determined to continue our fight by peaceful methods and with the sole aim of sparing the public all inconvenience, we have decided to call off the strike from 6 a.m. on the 30thMinor incidents occurred till 2 August 1928, when the South Indian Railway Workers' Union was officially outlawed.