During the unprecedented global crisis resulting from the coronavirus pandemic, the Indian government has failed to safeguard the rights of labourers and workers who receive daily wages. They became one of the most vulnerable groups in India during this crisis. State-level governments, including in Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, and Punjab, increased the maximum labour working hours from eight to 12 hours. 

In Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, ordinances were passed through which the majority of the labour laws concerning workers working for a daily or weekly wage were suspended. The Uttar Pradesh government, through an ordinance,suspended a total of 38 labour laws. Following a High Court decision on these circumstances, the Uttar Pradesh government withdrew this controversial order, but others remain in force. These changes were made to increase economic growth post-lockdown by ensuring flexible labour laws, attracting more investment. These changes disregard the safety of labourers also in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic. Even with the relatively low death rate of the COVID-19 virus, if applied to the massive Indian migrant labour force of 2.6 million persons, this still places thousands of people at risk.  

IMPACT ON MIGRANT WORKERS

The migrant workers were the worst hit by this pandemic. With no means of transportation and accommodation, they, along with children and pregnant women, had to travel hundreds of miles on foot. This not only exposes them to the risk of contracting the virus but also to the wrath of the police enforcing COVID-19 regulations. 

Many migrant workers lost their employment on short notice because of the nationwide lockdown. As most labourers earn daily wages, in lockdown they found themselves facing adversities without sufficient resources and knowledge. The government should have intervened to safeguard them, but, instead, it suspended many of the laws that safeguard their labour rights. 

According to a survey of 11,159 workers of various states, about 90 percent of the migrant workers did not receive a ration from the government and were denied payment by their employers. An ordinance passed by the Uttar Pradesh government exempts the employers from complying with the Industrial Disputes Act 1947, which exposes labourers to mistreatment by their employers and allows them to be dismissed at will. There is a real danger that the relaxation of labour standards in some states will also spread to other parts of the country. 

Labour falls under the concurrent list in the Constitution of India, implying that both the central and the state governments can make changes to certain provisions. Changes must be lawful and approved by the central government. However, the laws that are being adopted during the pandemic are exploitative, and laws should instead be crafted to protect workers.

RESPONSE BY THE JUDICIARY

The Indian Supreme Court failed to take cognizance of this crisis. Answering a petition filed by Alakh Alok Srivastava, an expert in labour law at the Indian Law Institute, the government reported that 600,000 migrant labourers were placed in government shelters and about 2.2 million were provided with food. The court did not take account of the millions of other migrant labourers who were stranded on the streets across the country. The Solicitor General made a statement that as of 11 a.m. on 31 March 2020, “not a single migrant was walking”. The Supreme Court accepted these claims even while incidents of migrant workers being stranded on the street were being reported across the country. The Supreme Court and the Executive thus turned a blind eye to these problems while the majority of labour laws were being suspended by the states. 

However, the High Courts responded more appropriately to the plight of labourers. Karnataka High Court reprimanded the state government for collecting train fares from the labourers. It asked the state government to confirm to the Court whether it will deviate from the national policy of allowing “a migrant worker who has no income and is not in a position to pay railway fare” to travel home. The Andhra Pradesh High Court gave instructions for tents to be set up for homeless migrants. The Patna High Court took suo moto cognizance of the plight of children from the lower strata of society, including children of labourers, due to non-availability of mid-day meals.

THE NEED TO ENSURE THE RIGHTS OF LABOURERS

Human rights are inherent to all human beings, without discrimination. The ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, adopted in 1998, states that economic growth alone is not enough to ensure equity and social progress. Yet the Indian government is focused on increasing investment opportunities to improve foreign investment to bring the economy back on track while labourers across the country are struggling to secure basic goods to ensure their survival. In this unprecedented global crisis due to COVID-19, the precarious conditions of labourers are being grossly neglected, and the government is wrongly treating them as commodities that are to be risked for economic growth.

Pranav is a 1st-year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student at the Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, Punjab. He has a keen interest in the field of human rights law, constitutional law, and international law.