THE IMPACT OF THE COVID-19 ON MIGRANT LABOUR

admin | July 15, 2020 | Law | 1 Comment

THIS ARTICLE WAS WRITTEN BY HITARTH DIXIT, A STUDENT OF RAJIV GANDHI NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF LAW

INTRODUCTION

Recently the states of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat decided to implement major changes in their labour laws, with UP making a tough decision by suspending almost all the labour laws for 3 years. Rajasthan, Punjab and Odisha also decided to make some changes but smaller in scope as compared to those of UP. Apparently, these changes are brought to incentivize economic activity in the respective states.[1]

To have an estimate there are around 200 state laws and 50 central laws .yet there is no proper set of definition of ‘labour laws’ in the country. to overcome that situation union government is planning to merge 44 labour laws under 4 codes which are:

Wages
Industrial relations
Social security and occupation safety
Health and working conditions[2]

MAJOR CHALLENGES FOR GOVERNMENT

As 90 percent of the labour are in the unorganized sector, which means they are not benefited from most of the government aided welfare schemes for labours which put them in a greater subject of risk. The bigger problem the government is facing is the recent death of migrant workers walking back their homes during lockdown due to the pandemic. However , the lockdown was introduced to curb the spread of Covid-19 ,but it has an devastating impact on the life of daily workers especially the migrant labours. As everything was shut down during the pandemic these labour has no source of income which leads to no means of livelihood and they to prevent themselves from this they are migrating back to their home miles away.

Here the question arises that whether is there any law for the protection of migrant workers trying to walk home miles away. The people who are working for the labour welfare have recalled ‘Inter-state Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Services) Act, 1979’ which regulates the employment and working conditions of inter-state migrant.

INTER-STATE MIGRANT WORKMEN ACT, 1979

As per this law Inter-state migrant worker means-

“any person who is recruited by or through a contractor in one State under an agreement or other arrangement for employment in an establishment in another State, whether with or without the knowledge of the principal employer in relation to such establishment[3]”

This law is applicable to-

“to every establishment in which five or more inter-State migrant workmen (whether or not in addition to other workmen) are employed or who were employed on any day of the preceding twelve months”[4]
“to every contractor who employs or who employed five or more inter-State migrant workmen (whether or not in addition to other workmen) on any day of the preceding twelve months[5].”

This law envisages a system of registration of such establishment from the local authority. The principle as well as the contractor who recruits workmen from one state for deployment in another state should obtain a license/certificate of registration from the relevant authority.

Registration of establishment is the first layer of protection to migrant labours as it creates a system of accountability. Also it helps the government to keep track of the number of workers employed and provides a legal basis for regulating their condition for service.

The contractor must provide terms and condition to the worker on the basis of which they recruiting. These terms include:

“The remuneration payable , hours of work ,fixation of wages and other essential amenities in respect of the inter-State migrant workmen[6]”

And if in same establishment , different labours doing same kind of work then the wage rates, holidays, hours of work and other conditions of service shall remain same for all the workers. In no case, their wages are lower than what is prescribed under the Minimum wages Act,1948.

SUPREME COURT ORDER

Supreme Court pronounced its order dated June 9, 2020 by video conferencing, ordered the central and state government to transport the migrant labours who want to go to their native states within 15 days and form employment schemes and conduct skill mapping to rehabilitate them.

While writing this Article, further hearing is still pending on July 8, 2020.Key points of the order dated 9 July, 2020 are listed below:

A bench of Justice Ashok Bhushan,Sanjay Kishan Kaul and MR Shah asked the center and state government to make a list of all the migrant labours who have reached their native states and also list down their mode of employment prior to lockdown.
SC asked the center and state government to specify schemes for employment of the migrant labours post lockdown.
SC asked the center and state government to to give detail of all welfare schemes for the migrant labour.
SC asked railways to provide Shramik Special trains to states and UT’s within 24 hrs of receiving the requests.
Center told that states are asking for 171 Shramik Special trains to transport the remaining migrant labours to their homes.
SC ordered to withdraw all police complaints against the migrant labours that have been booked for violating the lockdown norms while trying to get back to their homes from their workplaces.
The court also asked to consider granting counseling to migrant workers who have returned home and giving them the employment opportunities according to their skill sets.[7]

CONCLUSION

Labour laws in India are inflexible. There are too many laws which are unnecessary complicated and ineffectively implemented. Essentially, if India has fewer numbers of labour laws then it will be easier to follow and then they can be effectively implemented. In a nation with 10 million people entering labour market ;flexibility and clarity in law will make a strong case that they will be hired by industries which are looking to expand in labour market. This will also benefit the labour in the unorganized sector to have better salaries and social security benefits.

South-Asian countries like Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia have made their labour laws flexible due to which the labour intensive sector has become more competitive[8]. India should also look forward in making its labour laws more flexible, so that it can also take advantage from the US-China trade war.

In case you want to understand more about employment and labor laws, kindly visit a great employment law firm here.

[1] KR Shyam Sundar and Rahul Suresh Sapkal, Changes to Labour Laws by State Governments Will Lead to Anarchy in the Labour Market,engage(July 1,2020,9:43 AM), https://www.epw.in/engage/article/changes-labour-laws-state-market-anarchy-labour-market

[2] Ministry of Labour and Employment,Government of India,Labour Law Reforms(June 1,2020,6:43 PM), https://labour.gov.in/labour-law-reforms

[3] Inter-state Migrant Workmen Act, 1979,section 2(1)(e)

[4] Inter-state Migrant Workmen Act, 1979,section 3(a)

[5] Inter-state Migrant Workmen Act, 1979,section 3(b)

[6] Inter-state Migrant Workmen Act, 1979,section 8(2)

[7] 2020 SCC Online SC 492

[8] Deb Das and Gunajit Kalita, Do Labor Intensive Industries Generate Employment?,Researchgate(june 4,2020,7:14 PM),https://www.researchgate.net/publication/46476913_Do_Labor_Intensive_Industries_Generate_Employment_Evidence_from_firm_level_survey_in_India