Wages and Code

The New Labour Code Acts: Assault on Rights of Women Workers

“It is true that where the State refrains from intervention what remains is liberty. But this does not dispel of the matter. One more question remains to be answered. To whom and for whom is this liberty? Obviously, this liberty is liberty to the landlords to increase rents, for capitalists to increase hours of work and reduce rate of wages… In other words what is called liberty from the control of the State is another name for the dictatorship of the private employer.”

-Dr B.R. Ambedkar

The New OHS Code: Fresh Assault on Migrant Workers’ Rights

Despite the fact that migrant workers are indispensable to the creation of an urban city, the migrant worker as a category has been made constantly invisible.  These invisible masses of workers came into the spotlight only during the brutally imposed lockdown, when the country saw an exodus of reverse migration and brutal deaths of hundreds of workers while making the long journey home. Despite their invisibility, the category of migrant workers is massive.

Contract Labour – the Principal Sham

 

Introduction

More than 50 years after the enactment of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970 [‘1970 Act’], the Government is seeking to grant statutory sanction to the burgeoning contractualisation across public and private sectors. The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 [‘OSH Code’], which consolidates a number of beneficial workers legislations including the 1970 Act, practically authorizes the use of contract labour in a number of core, perennial and necessary functions.

The Policy Shift

The Exceptions that Prove the (Corporate) Rule: Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020

The new Labour Codes that will repeal 44 Central legislations enacted from 1923 and thereafter, can be characterized very simply, as a hoax. This note will look at the aspect of far-reaching exemptions included in the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 [‘OSH Code’], to show how any benefits provided by the Code are at the mercy of the pro-corporate dispensation.

Exemptions Apparent

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