Courtesy of COVID 19, with India’s decision of a national lockdown, emerged the precarious reality and vulnerabilities of labour relations in the country. No doubt, as the spread of COVID-19 continues, “social distancing” is the key to fight the pandemic, however the concept is problematic as it is based on the ubiquitous “one size fits all”. The disparate impact of the COVID 19 pandemic on humankind needs to be acknowledged. The 24th March televised speech of Prime Minister Modi gave just four hours to the 1.3 billion citizenry of India to shift their workplace routine into a virtual/home space. This vicissitude locates itself based on privileges, leaving the poor and the massive informal workforce on the margins. This is reflective of the human face of a deeper crisis which has been building for decades now, exposing the darker underbelly of labour and exploitation that fuels India’s economic growth. According to ILO, with a share of almost 90 per cent of people working in the informal economy in India, about 400 million workers are at risk of falling deeper into poverty during the crisis.
Further, due to the travel ban, with their livelihood grinding to a halt and meagre savings running out fast, countless unemployed migrant labourers are walking hundreds of kilometres to reach the relative safety of their villages.
The government’s response to the situation shows a significant gap between the “high-minded” intentions of the existing laws and their “perfunctory” implementation. A key piece of legislation, Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1979, exists on paper to prevent the exploitation of inter-state migrant workmen, by ensuring all of them are registered with their respective employers, are being provided with decent wages, displacement allowance and remittance for the journey. Had this act been implemented thoroughly, the state governments would have had complete details of these workers, however, all the states in India were taken aback by the immediate response of the migrant workers to the lockdown, who were desperate to return to their homes. This reveals the cracks in India’s social security net system, the consequence of which is the absence of government preparedness and the consequent failure in preventing genuine hardships for vulnerable groups.
In addition to this, state governments have relaxed the labour laws to encourage the corporates to run their plants and prop up the investments during the slowdown period. Uttar Pradesh decided to suspend the applicability of labour laws for a period of three years. The government of Madhya Pradesh also took a similar decision. Moreover, due to labour shortage, Maharashtra has tweaked the labour laws to increase the working hours, up to 12 hours a shift. The relaxation in labour laws implies that the statutory safety provided to the workers stands withdrawn, which clearly allows employers to hire and fire the contract workers. The concern behind the decision is that employers may misuse this norm as per their convenience, and this may aggravate pain for the poor workers who are most affected on account of Covid-19. Until we develop a plan of action that respects this labour force, there can be no real revival of India’s economy or society.
Submitted by:
TANYA CHAUDHARY
B.A (H) POLITICAL SCIENCE,
MIRANDA HOUSE, UNIVERSITY OF DELHI
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