Apart from a sudden change in their behaviour pattern, Mohanbhai, Shankerbhai, Jaisukhbhai have something in common: their joblessness. They are just three of those affected by the severe recession in the industrial belt around the city.

Though their acts of violence are mostly restricted to the home, and only occasionally find their way into the police records, no one is under-estimating the long-term ramifications of the phenomenon. ``After all, it's happened in Ahmedabad and Surat. They started as minor problems and went on to assume demonic proportions'', points out a distraught mill-worker.

According to industry estimates, more than 40 per cent of the small-scale industries and 35 per cent of the medium-scale units have closed down in the district in the past two years. Thirty per cent of the large industries have cut down their production drastically in the same time period.

The worst affected are the Nandesari and Makarpura industrial areas. About 50 per cent of the 300 units in Nandesari have either shut shop or have minimised their production. Around 45 per cent of the Makarpura units -- mostly SSIs -- have closed down altogether. ``It's a crisis. There's no alternative but to shut down units'', says M K Nair, former president of the Nandesari Industries Association.

If the trends the statistics portray are alarming, the tales they hide are even more so. More than 50,000 workers rendered jobless by the industrial slow-down; the violent spinoff of unemployment is just beginning to manifest itself.

In the past six months, more than 50 cases of domestic violence have been reported in various police stations of the district. Though no figures are available to determine the involvement of the jobless, Deputy Commissioner of Police Mohan Jha agrees there is an undeniable connection.

Psychologists say violence is often the outcome of a shattered self-image. ``They feel less important than when they were working. They try to compensate that depression with a show of one upmanship, maybe through beating the wife or the child'', says Dr Bimla Parimoo.

``But the situation is not as alarming as Ahmedabad's'', Jha insists. Trade unionist Rohit Prajapati, however, differs. ``They (the jobless) are suffering. A worker used to earning Rs 4,000-Rs 5,0000 and enjoying a decent life suddenly finds himself a slum-dweller, unable to ensure his family's survival. Violence is inevitable'', he says, claiming there has been a sharp rise in wife-beating among the workers rendered jobless by the recession.

While Parimoo suggests the primary remedy is to ensure such people have some work, their re-employment seems remote in view of the depressed market scenario. Deteriorating worker-management relations, which leads workers to blame the employers squarely for their condition, make matters worse.

``First they introduce the voluntary retirement scheme, and when the number of workers falls below 100, they close down the unit. This way, they steer clear of legal hassles'', says New United Employees' Union general secretary Vasant Dadaji Patil.

His statement bears weight when one considers the fact that despite the closure of hundreds of units, only one -- APS Star -- has been issued a notice for illegal closure. ``What can we do? If the number of workers is less than 100, regulations prohibit us from issuing notices. Only APS Star employed more than 100 people,'' says a defensive Assistant Labour Commissioner K U Shah.

Industry, moreover, claims that the workers are at least partially responsible for the closure of units. ``A number of factors lead to closure, but unreasonable demands by workers do contribute to the problem'', maintains Naresh Gandhi, honourary secretary of the Federation of Small Scale Industries and executive member of the All-India Federation of SSIs.

With the responsibility for the workers' plight yet to be fixed, and society in no position to offer them any kind of rehabilitation, recession-hit workers are fast reaching the point of no return.