Right to safe work
The maximum daytime temperatures in the Kalaburagi and Belagavi districts of Karnataka this week are expected to be 41º C and in the late 30sº C, respectively. Research has found that if the relative humidity is high enough to render a wet-bulb temperature exceeding 30º C, outdoor exposure of even a few minutes can prove fatal.
Yet many workers, especially in the country’s informal sector, routinely work outdoors in extreme heat with poor access to clean cool water, breaks from work, and medical attention. State-level policies and district-level heat-action plans are crucial to catch individuals who ‘slip’ through the protections available to the formal labour force.
In this spirit, Tamil Nadu and Telangana recently notified extreme heat as a state-specific disaster. Earlier this month, Karnataka also said government offices would close by 1.30 pm in April and May and that workers employed under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) in the Kalaburagi and Belagavi revenue divisions — comprising 14 districts — would receive a workload concession of 30% without any reduction in wages.
State Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Minister Priyank Kharge said the decision aims to protect rural labourers from the harshest heat during working hours. He also directed officers to ensure clean drinking water, first-aid kits, and shaded areas are availed to the workers.
These initiatives are all on the right track because they’re cognisant of the fact that climate change will force the cost of economic growth to increase. For example, sans the concession granted by Karnataka — a notably substantive state-level policy for working in less-than-ideal conditions — workers may have had to set aside a larger fraction of their incomes to pay for medical care for heat-related injuries.
However, Times of India and Deccan Herald have since reported citing a recent survey by a non-governmental organisation, ActionAid India, that many workers in Belagavi were unaware of the state’s announcement nor had been accorded the promised infrastructure.
Aside from leaving the Act’s beneficiaries bereft of social protections, the lacuna recalled that the enforcement of state- and district-level plans remains at the mercy of local bureaucrats and that there is no democratic mechanism to ensure state governments keep their promises. In this way, the additional cost imposed by extreme weather is passed to a population already dangerously vulnerable to high heat and the social welfare dimensions of climate adaptation efforts continue to remain on paper.
Ultimately, the Act’s goals are themselves ill-served: rather than epitomise the ‘right to employment’, and thanks to the Centre’s repeated interference with its conduct and both the Union and state governments’ failure to upskill workers to look for less injurious employment, its workers now risk a ‘right to exploitation’.
