It is past 9 p.m. and dozens of headload workers, including Shambhu Rai, 52, are sitting in small groups around fires to cook their dinner inside a large shed in Azadpur Mandi. Many others are getting ready to spend the night at the shed, next to hundreds of sacks of onions.
“I have been working here for the past 30 years and now my knees hurt. Our work is not limited to unloading onions, we sort them and prepare samples for our customers. At night, we stay at the shed to make sure that no one steals them. In a way, we work 24 hours,” said Rai.
“Despite this, we are paid just for unloading or weighing and there is no job security. If we raise our concerns, we can get thrown out,” he said at the Azadpur Mandi, said to be Asia’s “largest” fruit and agriculture produce market.
Legislation hanging fire
Like Rai, thousands of headload workers work with commission agents and many independently, but without any social security.
In 2015, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had told the National Hamal Panchayat (NHP) that he would “enact fast” a legislation to provide social security to headload workers, but it is yet to happen. “The CM told him (Baba Adhav, president of the National Hamal Panchayat) that he would discuss it with the Labour Minister and see how the law can be enacted fast,” an AAP statement about Mr. Kejriwal’s meeting with the NHP on April 26, 2015, read. “Keep guiding us on the issue, we will pass it,” the CM was quoted saying.
Though a draft Bill – to give benefits such as insurance cover, overtime charges, weekly day off, safe working space and provident fund – was put in the public domain in 2019 for comments, it has been lying in cold storage since then.
Meanwhile, headload workers complain that they are getting paid “less” and that their rates are not revised periodically.
The Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee, Azadpur, which manages the market, has not revised the official rates since 1980, officials confirmed. Instead, traders and commission agents have been increasing the rates every two years in consultation with workers.
‘Rates terribly low’
In 1980, the APMC had fixed the rate for unloading a bag of onions at ₹1 and a bag of potatoes at ₹1.20. Over the years, traders and agents have raised it, and at present it stands at ₹4-5, which experts have termed “terribly low”.
When contacted, APMC officials and Potato and Onion Merchants’ Association general secretary Rajendra Sharma said workers were getting paid the “highest” in the country, but did not provide any data to support it.
Asked about workers complaining that they have to sleep next to the produce at night, he said, “That is their choice. They don’t have to guard the sacks as there are security guards for doing it.”
A Delhi government official said it did not proceed with the 2019 draft Bill on social security as by then the Central government was in the process of passing four labour codes. “One of the four codes, the social security code, had provisions similar to the Bill and there was a lot of duplication,” he said.
Asked whether the Delhi government can enact a law to give benefits to workers despite the Centre’s labour codes, Jayati Ghosh, professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, U.S., said, “Yes, the Delhi government can certainly do it. But thus far it has not shown the best employment practices when it comes to its own workers. ASHA, anganwadi and other scheme workers do not get minimum wages or the required social security benefits.”
Workers complain
At the potato market, Keval Yadav, 32, who is not part of any union, complained: “I have been working here for the past 24 years, but I cannot get registered with the APMC as I’m not attached to any commission agent.”
“We have to struggle to increase our wages by even 50 paisa per bag,” said Byas Muni, 42, who has been working at the fruit market for 25 years and is also not part of any union. Several other workers said increasing the rates was not easy.
According to APMC officials, only 1,200-1,400 workers are registered at the Azadpur Mandi and they have been given “category G” licence. Though they said that there are around 3,000-4,000 headload workers, the NHP put the figure at not less than 40,000. A licence, the NHP said, would help the workers get benefits in future.
The NHP said on an average a headload worker earns ₹400 a day, though Delhi’s official minimum wage for unskilled labour is ₹635 per day. NHP general secretary Prakash Kumar said the official rates were not being revised as the APMC was in collusion with commission agents, a charge rejected by both.
The organisation has filed a writ petition in the Delhi High Court requesting the court’s intervention to fulfil their demands. The court is yet to pass a judgment on it.
“Workers are scared to talk as they know that agents will fire them if they do,” Mr. Kumar said. “They are exploited by commission agents.”
