Krishna Jha

It was May Day when workers all over the world were waking up to the reality that they too have rights, as a class. For us in India, outcome was All India Trade Union Congress that came into existence in 1920, with Lala Lajpat Rai as president. Capitalism had started settling in. Even in agrarian sector, it had entered forcing the peasants to slog on their own fields like agri workers with a pittance of return not even enough to meet the basics. Industries were coming up in urban areas like in Bombay, there were cotton mills and in Calcutta, jute mills and so were workers, slogging for sixteen to sometime even twenty hours without a right of their own.

It was also beginnings of an awareness that revealed that it was labour that they were selling, not freedom. In the primary stage, it was a blind torture, workers went through all the hardships with lips sealed. But soon they realized their own power, being the kingpins in the entire production process. They were landless peasantry and starving workers. Here started emergence of early labour consciousness. There were restrictions passed in 1881 and 1891, on women and child labour, though nobody cared about them.

With age no bar, even seniors and very young had to go down the mines, handle cotton without ventilation and slog for long hours. It was a time when the awareness started turning into action. Workers started fighting, but cause was not very clear yet. Between 1882 to 1890, there more than twenty five strikes recorded in Bombay and Madras. In these struggles, it was the community consciousness that was leading them, not yet the class.

The period was almost the same when the workers started rising almost all over the world. In some countries, like in United States and Canada, they had started observing the first Monday of September as Labour Day.

The American Federation of Labour and other trade unions called for industrial strike all over the US on May 1, 1886, demanding 8-hour workday, a schedule of eight hours for labour, eight hours for recreation, and eight hours for rest. Thousands of workers in Chicago on May 4, 1886 organised a mass meeting on the same demands. A bomb exploded at a labour rally in Haymarket Square followed by shelling by the police forces, killing seven police officers, labourers, and at least four bystanders. Workers across the United States came together protesting against the police firings and demanding their rights and to fight for better working conditions after the movement took a violent turn.

Though there was not enough evidence available, Judge imposed the death sentence on seven of men and last was given fifteen years of imprisonment. On November 11, 1893, four of them were executed. Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld pardoned the remaining leaders. Actually evidences were found that it was a conspiracy to victimize the striking workers. The strike demanding eight hour shift was taken up all over the world. Second International issued a declaration in 1889 that first May would be celebrated as Workers Day.

But within two centuries, as the modern era is fading under the influence of scientific technological revolution, corporate are firm so far as workers’ duty hours are concerned. Hard earned rights, for which masses have sacrificed their lives, have been replaced by same exploitative steps, stretching the work hours to twelve or more hours. The hard-won workers’ rights that were enshrined in the earlier labour laws have been undemocratically and unconstitutionally either diluted or deleted in the name of ‘ease of doing business’. There have been countrywide strikes by AITUC and other organizations against the central government’s anti-worker policies and actions, but without any result.

The entire set of Labour laws have been confined to Four Labour Codes. Under the new labour code, the term ‘factory’ excludes employers with less than 20 workers from any liability, the daily working hours have gone from eight to twelve, with many states already in the process of implementing it. Employers with less than 300 workers in their factories no longer need prior permission from appropriate government authorities for layoff or closure. Unions fear that the introduction of ‘fixed term employment’ in the new law will further increase precarious working conditions. The changed law also fails to ensure social security for all workers..

As a member state of the International Labour Organisation {ILO}, India has obligations to respect international labour standards, but in reality, the government is following policies to the contrary.

With technological advancement, there is an increased productivity which substantially should also decrease the working hours of labourers. The World Federation for Trade Unions (WFTU) have been demanding to slash working hours to 35 hours per week. On the contrary, employers have been exempted to increase the working hours.

Labour being a subject on the concurrent list, both the Centre and the states can frame laws and rules. The government has been keen on an all-India implementation of the code, with many states reforming their labour laws despite opposition from trade unions, including Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Tamil Nadu; etc. The policies and amendments by the government have further undermined the position of labourers, migrant workers, and scheme workers. While trade unions have demanded the government to set the minimum wage rate at Rs 26,000 per month, the current minimum wage standards are fixed at less than Rs 9,000 per month.

Despite over 80 lakh scheme workers, mostly women employed under different ministries and departments of the central government-sponsored programs like Mid Day Meals, ASHA, Aanganwadi; etc., the government refuses to recognise them as workers, thus denying them the rights and privileges under labour laws.

Ninety-six per cent of the working women are employed in the unorganised sector, thus making them marginalised amongst the marginalised. While the Supreme Court guarantees these women social welfare benefits, these benefits can only be accessed if the women hold the Below Poverty Line (BPL) status.

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