Labour rights domestic workers india


Globally, there are It is estimated that the majority of domestic workers are excluded from social security, or if covered, enjoy a lower level of protection in comparison with other workers. Such exclusion, together with low wages, weak job security and poor working conditions, has negative consequences for domestic workers mostly women. As a result, many domestic workers are excluded from effective access to health care, as well as from income security in the event of maternity, employment injury, unemployment or old age, which constitutes an additional source of vulnerability for them and their families. This module highlights the specific challenges of extending social security to domestic workers and explores some policy options, based on international experience and guided by ILO social security standards.


We are searching data for your request:

Employee Feedback Database:
Leadership data:
Data of the Unified State Register of Legal Entities:
Wait the end of the search in all databases.
Upon completion, a link will appear to access the found materials.
Content:
WATCH RELATED VIDEO: What does the law say? - Rights of Domestic Workers

Domestic Workers In India Have No Laws Protecting Their Rights


Due to various reasons like drought, lack of agriculture, lack of employment option, land acquisition in the name of development, displacement, harassment of Dalit class, lack of basic amenities like medical facilities, water, etc. These migrants are mostly poor and disadvantaged and they get work in the unorganized sector in the city.

Women also have to work because of the high cost of living and poor economic conditions. Due to the lack of education and skill in women, the easiest livelihood for them is domestic work and they are forced to do it. The work that fits into this category includes gardening, babysitting, cooking, sweeping, swabbing, dusting, washing utensils, washing clothes, attendants for sick and elderly , drivers, security guards, car cleaning, etc.

While some of these jobs are done by male domestic workers almost all the other jobs are done by women domestic workers.

According to the National Sample Survey , there were 2,38,92, domestic workers in the country out of which 4,05, were women and 21,79, were working in the city. In the five years between and , the number of female domestic workers increased by For this reason, the share of women in working population has increased from Domestic workers have to face many types of problems in both home and workspaces.

On the one hand, they do not always get a happy atmosphere and support at home; on the other hand, the situation at their workplace is mostly that of discrimination and insecurity. The society's view of domestic workers is not good in general. Their work is not considered dignified and their work is not given importance and they are considered to be servants instead of workers. It hurts their self-esteem but they bear it silently believing it to be their fate.

If there are incidents of sexual harassment with them in the workplace, the society also blames them. Female domestic workers invest their entire earning in their families, yet they rarely have a say in the major family decisions. These women have to face domestic violence. Their husbands normally consume alcohol from their own wages, so the responsibility of running the whole house comes on these women's shoulders.

These women do not have any social or economic security. There are no domestic women workers associations or NGOs that come forward to help them. Therefore when there is injustice done to them, nobody comes forward to fight for them.

In the absence of such organizations, their demands do not become known to the public. Female domestic workers work for approx. Most of the time, during the work, their hands are in water containing detergents or phenyl, which causes wounds in the fingers.

Usage of cold water in winters to wash clothes, utensils or swab the floor accentuates the development of arthritis in the fingers and hands of these women.

They are not allowed to use toilets in the workplace, due to which they drink less water, often due to this, they develop urine infections. Due to drinking less water, there is a possibility of kidney damage also. There are many occasions when these women become victims of physical violence, sexual abuse, and inhuman behavior at the workplace. According to a research by Human Rights Watch, domestic servants in India have to face extreme harassment.

The women and child development department informed the Rajya Sabha in February that cases of violence are increasing with domestic workers in the country and between and , 10, cases of domestic crime against domestic workers were registered, in which cases were registered in , in and cases were registered in If anything gets stolen in the house, then the first person to suspect is the domestic worker.

These women do not get any facilities like weekly off, annual vacation, maternity leave, sick leave, insurance, social security benefits etc. If there is an accident at the workplace, the employer does not pay for the medical treatment of the worker.

The contribution of domestic workers in the country's economy is never assessed; they are not given a status of workers. Because of this, they do not have any specific pay scale and do not enjoy pay hikes or allowances like workers in other sectors.

The wages given to domestic workers are less than the minimum wages in the country. Placement agencies make a lot of false promises of them getting big salaries and allowances and bonuses and then they sometimes exploit them financially and also physically.

In order to safeguard the rights of the domestic women workers, in a Bill called Domestic Workers Conditions of Employment was introduced, which could not be passed. Again, the Unorganized Workers Safety Act domestic workers also included did not implement its provisions properly. The International Labor Organization announced the rights and policies, principles of domestic workers in the domestic workers' convention on June 16, The International Labour Organization ILO has also drawn specific attention to domestic workers, who have a right to "enjoy effective protection against all forms of abuse, harassment, and violence".

In the year , Labor Welfare has drafted a national policy for domestic workers in which the minimum wage, hours of work, annual leave with salary, medical leave, maternity leave, social security, accident and health insurance and protection from sexual abuse, were to be included in the contracts between domestic workers and their employers.

The National Health Insurance Scheme was announced in this year's budget which will cover 10 crores 'vulnerable' families. The health coverage of the scheme will be up to Rs 5 lacs per family per year for secondary and tertiary hospitalization. In Madhya Pradesh, under the Chief Minister's Urban Domestic Working Women Welfare Scheme the female domestic workers are registered and provided social security, education, health treatment, maternity leave, and insurance.

Domestic workers have not been given the status of labourers. This is the reason that the women who work as domestic workers have been neglected for minimum wages, hours of work, protection from occupational hazards etc.

Domestic workers are poor, deprived and belong to lower classes and do not have the strength and neither have the freedom to speak. In such situations, the employer exploits the cheap and easily available labour. Domestic workers are not getting good wages or better work environments, there are no regular working hours, they have to face violence, abuse, sexual harassment at workplace, exploitation by brokers and placement agencies; forced migration; there is a lack of welfare schemes; they are faced with major problems like lack of opportunities to move forward.

The biggest problem is that they do not have any organization, because they have little or no bargaining power and they cannot even raise their issues properly. In the Sustainable Development Goals - Gender equality and empowerment of all women and girls is to be achieved by The Government of India has committed to this.

Therefore, the government will have to make serious efforts to recognize domestic workers as women and to give importance to their work. For this, the government will have to bring out a national policy at the earliest for domestic workers, by providing skill development training; there should be a legal contract between employers and domestic workers.

Every female domestic worker should be mandatorily given information regarding sexual harassment in the workplace. The government has to create more and more welfare schemes such as a discount for a smart card to travel in public transport or lower rate of interest on bank loans. At the same time, domestic workers must be organized to fight for their rights and they will have to link themselves to the wider struggle of the workers, only then they and their work will be given honor and respect.

The views expressed in the above article are that of Upasana Behar of Charkha Features. Tags Disclaimer :- This story has not been edited by Outlook staff and is auto-generated from news agency feeds. A personal account of torture by security forces led to a play depicting the horrors of a draconian law. Tired of the unceasing, ungainly internet entertainment updates? Walk dazzling lanes and by lanes with Outlook.

Know what's behind the apparent and what doesn't show. Your journey into the myriad shades of truth with Outlook. Disclaimer :- This story has not been edited by Outlook staff and is auto-generated from news agency feeds.

Source: ANI. Outlook Newsletters Ent. AR Tired of the unceasing, ungainly internet entertainment updates? Tech in style The right tech that defines you. Your aspirations. Your styles. Right in time. The Smart Surfer Stay on top of the market moves.

Analysis and information for you to take smart decisions. Ambit Know what's behind the apparent and what doesn't show. The Coffer Money market essentials, analysis and data delivered to your mailbox with precision timing.



India: domestic workers

The Indian state is clearly not ready to consider the home as a workplace worth regulation or monitoring. This week has brought us another news story of a domestic worker in Delhi—a minor, just 13 years old —being confined, starved and physically assaulted by her employer before being finally rescued from virtual slavery in a household. This comes within a month of the much publicized case of an year-old Santhal girl from Jharkhand who underwent brutal torture at the hands of her employer, before being rescued by an NGO working with the police. Over the past few years, there have been innumerable cases of domestic workers—nearly all of them female, many of them minors—being abused and exploited by their employers.

Drawing on primary research with informal workers' movements in construction and domestic work, as well as an historical analysis using court documents and.

Domestic Workers in India: Need for Legislation and Change in Governmental Attitude

Over the past 18 months, the Covid pandemic has demonstrated just how vital care work is, and yet domestic workers — mostly women — have been among the hardest hit by the effects of the pandemic. It has shaken the job and income security of millions of domestic workers, putting them at greater risk of abuse, exploitation, and trafficking. This call to action forms an intrinsic part of the global care economy agenda which requires increased investments in care, including the creation of millions of decent care jobs, and the transitioning of informal care jobs to formal jobs with decent pay and working conditions as part of a gender-responsive just transition to a carbon-neutral economy. Since the Convention and Recommendation were adopted in , the ILO estimates that there has been:. In there were at least Domestic workers usually work long hours for very low wages and are often excluded from labour and social protections. Where protections and enumerated rights do exist in national legislation, there is a high risk of non-compliance due to the lack of adequate enforcement mechanisms including their right to organise and to collective bargaining. The risk of abuse and exploitation is even higher for migrant domestic workers, who have limited or no freedom to change employers, are often dependent on illicit recruitment agencies imposing exorbitant recruitment fees and stringent visa terms. The ILO estimates that, globally :. But you also must love the workers you are fighting for.


India: Domestic Workers nation-wide protest against exclusion by new labour codes

labour rights domestic workers india

Law No. Executive regulations of Law No. Decision No. Most importantly, the decision bans offices from placing advertisements for domestic workers in the media, considering this practice as tantamount to human trafficking.

This study explores the labour rights discourse produced by Brazilian domestic workers.

Rights for Domestic Workers

Focuses on legal as well as social, psycho-social, economic, and cultural dimensions of domestic work. Contains useful takeaways for teachers, students, practitioners, policy-makers, and civil society organizations working in the unorganized sector. Jindal Global University. Mahanta has completed her Ph. Gupta received his LL.


Regulation of Domestic Work

A domestic worker washing clothes in Ahemdabad. The sprawling bastis , chawls , and slums, which we attempt to hide from the gaze of the outside world , are the living realities for millions of working people — men, women, and children. They intrinsically appear in our elitist and sexist jokes — as the tagline of bookmybai. The idea of rights for them tweaks our idea of comfort. In , Harish Rawat, the minister of state for labour and employment, accepted that there was no authentic data available on the number of domestic workers in India. Before that, according to the census , it was around 6.

“Every domestic worker faces the same issues.” Through these platforms it also shares information on entitlements, and referral services for.

Can data help improve migrant domestic workers' lives?

The nationwide lockdown following the coronavirus pandemic Covid , and the overriding imperative of social distancing, have affected work. What has been most hit is work that puts people in close physical proximity with each other, and cannot be performed from home. Daily wage labour is one example, and the plight of such labourers has been highlighted in the media.


Needed: A law to protect domestic workers | Opinion

More women in India are receiving an education than ever before and the country has recorded consistent economic growth. Despite this, India continues to have one of lowest rates of female workforce participation in the world. Close to 54 percent of working age women between the ages of 15 to 59 are not available for work because of household responsibilities or domestic work. In addition, they undertake tasks such as fetching wood and water which goes towards the care and sustenance of their family. Such work is called many things — unpaid care work, reproductive work, social care functions and so on. Hired domestic workers ease the burden of individual households by undertaking household chores in return for remuneration.

Act II of

Don’t neglect the domestic worker

My ActionAid is an interactive space created exclusively for ActionAid donors to express themselves, to get in touch with us , to be a part of our campaigns and to trace their journey with the ActionAid family! Forgot password? To create a new donor account please Donate. Home Support Domestic Workers. While the Government and local administration have stepped forward to support and reach out to workers with relief packages, programmes and schemes to cope with the COVID crisis.

The issue of exploitation of women and children domestic workers is frequent and regularly reported. The domestic service is now accepted as an important category of livelihood. The steep decline in agrarian produce and livelihood security in rural areas has caused migration of rural people to urban areas. The number of 'Women Domestic Workers' is constantly growing in the informal sector of urban India.


Comments: 4
Thanks! Your comment will appear after verification.
Add a comment

  1. Jules

    You are not right. I can prove it. Email me at PM, we will discuss.

  2. Nikokora

    I'm sorry, but I think you are wrong. I'm sure. I can defend my position. Email me at PM.

  3. Kajigis

    Good article :) Just haven't found a link to the RSS blog?

  4. Welton

    It is simply matchless topic

+