Pooja, 27, from Uttar Pradesh, lost 4 fingers of her left hand, on a Power Press machine at a component supplier (name withheld to protect workers) to Hero and Honda in Haryana.
Having herself seen nine accidents in her factory, she became the 10th victim to a power press malfunction. Alone during the ordeal, her family and contractor abandoned her.
"घर में काम करने में दिक्कत होती है। औरतों में थोड़ी भी कमी होती है तो चार उंगलियां उठती है।"
According to her (and many others in our focus groups), women often outperform men in production, and yet face mistreatment. Pooja earned only 9,500 rupees monthly, less than male colleagues, working 12-hour shifts, 6 days a week, without overtime rate paid at legal rates, for an operator role which has a minimum wage of c.Rs12,500 in Haryana.
She was fired two months after the accident, and finding new work has been challenging for her due to her disability.
As we focus on assisting more women injured workers, we are finding more and more of them. In 2023, we assisted 213 of them; in the first half of 2024, we have already assisted 100+ injured women workers.
For every 1,000 injured workers assisted by Safe In India Foundation (SII) in Haryana and Maharashtra, around 90 (9%) are now women. In Faridabad, this number rises to 16%.
Despite being less visible, women in the auto sector face equal or slightly more severe risks of accidents, often losing fingers in these supplier factories. Women workers also appear to be losing fingers more often than men in Haryana (Faridabad and Manesar) though less in Maharashtra (Pune) in the automobile supply chain factories.
A brief 3 minute video of injured women workers focus group held in Nov. 2023:
As you would see from the video above:
Women appear to be paid c.10% less than men for operating the same “dangerous” machines. Women often start as helpers or packers, earning low wages, but are attracted to the slightly higher paying operator roles (an increase of Rs. c.1000-c.1500 per month) which they report is still about 10% less than men. These women workers report that they often outperform their male counterparts but are still paid less.
Women workers face job loss and struggle to find employment after injury (more than men). Anecdotally, SII has observed that employers tend to accommodate male injured workers with alternate post-injury jobs more than women. Many women end up without jobs after getting injured. Injured women workers have informed SII that women reemployed by the factories often face threats of termination if they advocate for safety measures or request documentation to access ESIC compensation, pensions and other entitled funds.
Many women face challenges post-injury in accessing compensation at ESIC. While both male and female workers experience issues after being injured, women face unique challenges. Unlike their male counterparts, women often require a male companion to access the services at ESIC and the documentation they need from employers following an injury.
Prof. Nisha Srivastava & Prof. Ravi Srivastava speaking on women workers (at the release of our report - CRUSHED23 - attended by 1000+ injured workers of which 200+ were women):
So what can we all do?
Jyoti, an injured woman worker's brave and articulate daughter, asks the automobile brands to stake specific steps (a one minute video) and so can you!
Please listen to young Jyoti and ask automobile brands to take responsibility for working conditions in their supply chain, especially women workers.
Its great to see some of them improving their policies in response to our nudging, but there a long way to go as you can see in our summary chart of SafetyNiti2024:
Join hands to save hands
Please share this blog widely. You can help Indian workers and Indian Labour Productivity (currently 133rd) by speaking to your relevant contacts in the auto industry, the government and media.
We welcome your thoughts and suggestions.
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