Is India’s industrial progress coming at the cost of workers lives

 

 

Even though India is aiming to become a global industrial powerhouse by encouraging investment and innovation with programs like ‘Startup India’, the fact cannot be denied that thousands of people die and become disabled every year in our country due to industrial accidents, which are all too common. It’s important to note that workers in small, unregistered factories are often most affected by industrial accidents. The victims are usually poor workers or migrants whose families don’t have the resources to fight legal battles. 

In recent years, the number of workers employed in factories in India has increased significantly. For instance, the number of workers employed in all factories in India rose from 5.96 million in 2001-02 to 12.22 million in 2017-18. However, the safety of these workers remains a concern. 

According to a report by global workers’ union IndustriAll, sectors such as manufacturing, chemicals, and construction report the most fatalities in India. Meanwhile, the Federal Ministry’s 2021 report stated that at least 6,500 workers died while working in factories, ports, mines, and construction sites in the last five years.  In this year alone, an average of seven accidents were reported every month in Indian manufacturing industries, killing more than 162 workers. The report also highlighted that on average, three workers die each day in Indian factories due to a lack of basic safety measures. Labor activists and labor organizations fear that this figure could be higher because many incidents are not reported.

It would not be wrong to say that India has witnessed many tragic incidents in the past, including industrial accidents that have resulted in loss of lives, injuries, and environmental damage. Some notable examples include - the Bombay dock explosion in 1944, the Chasnala Mining Disaster in 1975, the Bhopal gas tragedy in 1984, the fire at a textile factory in Ahmedabad in 1993, the Korba Chimney Collapse in 2009, the Mayapuri radiological incident in 2010, and the explosion at a chemical plant in Visakhapatnam in 2020, as well as Delhi’s Mundka building fire case in 2021 and in 2022 multiple tragedies occurred, such as the explosion at a fireworks factory in Virudhunagar district of Tamil Nadu, toxic gas release from a textile dyeing and printing factory in Vishwaprem Mill in Surat district, leakage of ammonia from a fish processing unit in Mangalore, and a reactor fire case in Megafine Pharma Company site in Lakhmapur-Nashik. These are some of the notable incidents among others.

The above heart- wrenching incidents highlight the serious lapses in safety measures and emphasize the importance of enhancing safety standards and regulatory oversight in India’s industrial sector. Thousands of workers losing their hands and fingers in accidents every year is leading to "human misery and loss of labour-productivity to the industry and the country," said the Crushed2022 report by Safe in India Foundation (SII), a Manesar-based organisation.

Industrial accidents in India are unfortunately quite common and can be attributed to various factors such as negligence on the part of the employer, carelessness on the part of employees, and natural disasters. One reason is also that the availability of health and safety inspectors is low in comparison to the density of factories. The country had 363,442 registered factories in 2020, of which 84% were operational and employed 20.3 million workers, according to the latest available DGFASLI data. On average, 1,109 deaths and more than 4,000 injuries in registered factories were reported each year, in four years to 2020, according to DGFASLI data, though DGFASLI data for 2021 and 2022 is not available to date. Therefore, the effective implementation of health and safety standards has long been a demand of unions and workers.

To address these issues, the Indian government has been working towards strengthening safety regulations, conducting inspections, and increasing penalties for non-compliance. The National Policy on Safety, Health and Environment at Workplace (NPSHEW) has been made which aims to establish a preventive safety and health culture in the country through elimination of the incidence of work-related injuries, diseases, fatalities, disasters and to enhance the well-being of employees in all the sectors of economic activity in the country.

India’s Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 (Included in the code was a change in the requirement for a safety committee in hazardous factories) which covers worker health, safety, and welfare, is a step towards improving the safety of industrial workplaces in India. The code outlines the duties of employers, rights of employees, important regulatory directives, and compliance obligations, but experts say the new OSH Code is less stringent than the Factories Act, 1948, which currently covers labour welfare and safety. Even so, more than two years later, the new OSH Code is yet to be implemented.

The Ministry of Labour & Employment is responsible for enforcing laws related to industrial safety and health in India. However, despite these measures, industrial accidents continue to occur in India. India has made progress in improving industrial safety, but there is still a long way to go. The government and private sector must continue to work together to ensure that industrial workplaces are safe and healthy for all workers.