International Labour Day

 

 

Origins: 

International Labour Day can be traced back to the late 19th-century labour movement in the United States. 

The specific date of May 1st was chosen to commemorate a nationwide strike for an eight-hour work day that commenced on that day in 1886. This pivotal event, however, culminated in the Haymarket Affair in Chicago, a regrettable incident where a labour protest escalated into violence. A bomb explosion resulted in the loss of life for seven police officers and at least four civilians.

 

Despite International Labour Day tracing its origin to the commemoration of the Haymarket affair in Chicago, Labour Day in Canada and the USA is celebrated on the first Monday in September and not May 1.

 

International Labour Day helps us to recognise the contributions of the labours and the working class in development of the society and the country. It also urges the labours to learn about their rights. Labours are often exploited, and it is important that they know their rights to protect themselves. It urges people to come together to develop the working and living conditions of the workers.

 

May Day is celebrated in more than 80 countries.

 

In India, the first May Day was celebrated in Chennai (then Madras) in 1923 by The Labour Kisan Party Of Hindustan.

 

Current State of India

With the rising woes of unemployment and pay gaps in wages, one would find themselves amidst what is clearly a very big shift in the overall nature of work in the daily work week.

Informal employment has risen — around half the jobs in the formal sector are of an informal nature. Self-employment and unpaid family work has also increased, especially for women.

Almost 82% of the workforce is engaged in the informal sector, and nearly 90% is informally employed, the India Employment Report 2024 stated.

The lack-lustre performance of our economy as we teeter towards a slow recession has begun forming cracks in the overall lifestyle of employees of various industry. 

 

With a over-burdened job market, the reduction of overall job vacancies with the growing number of graduates without employment. Its tough to say if the past policies or decisions have done much to help the rising numbers of labourers or employees. 

If workers rights are to be protected, there first need to be jobs for their rights to even be exercised. The low rate of placements along with a dizzying number of unemployed graduates from highly deemed institutes like IIT's or IIMs can make one wonder how bad the situation is for the less fortunate.

The pandemic has definitely changed the priorities of employers as most are more interested in advocating salary cuts along with mass layoffs to 'efficiently' manage their enterprises. While their stock prices and overall net values of their companies rise, the numbers in their employ brazenly drop into the ten thousands. 

Smaller number of employees are easier manage and most of the work can now be passed down to Artificial Intelligence. The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) could have an impact on employment. Not to forget that the outsourcing industry in India could be disrupted because some back-office tasks would be taken over by AI.  

While we turn over our day to day roles to machines, the dangers of taking jobs away from the labour we swore to protect and lend an ear to is imminent.

The lack of any addressing regarding this issue will likely create a great bulge of job insecurity, exploitation of skill for little to no monetary result and a rather immediate instability in the already competitive job market.

 

The state of the unskilled labour is no better than that of the skilled.

Growing rates of work related accidents with mis-management along with tight infrastructural schedules can attribute to an end number of problems adding to the weight that most unskilled workers carry.

Out biggest concern is also the lack of educational security for these unskilled labour which prompts very easy exploitation that often goes gravely unnoticed.

 

According to an article in the Indian Economic Times (published on 7th January 2024):

India is a labour-abundant economy. This abundance is in low-skilled labour, given that almost 80% of its working-age population does not have even a higher secondary education, with only an eighth of the working-age population having studied beyond high school.

 

This highlights a fatal flaw in our system. Gaps like these open room for employer's of distaste to make their workers work overtime for little wage.

 

In reference to another article by Scroll.in (published 12th May 2023):

 

The 32% increase in the country’s labour force means nothing if the labour force is not skilled. They will not only be unemployed, but unemployable. At best, they will be underemployed or deployed in the least productive way. Only about 5% of our labour force has undergone any formal skill training. 

 

Compare that with 68% in the UK, 75% in Germany, 52% in the US, 80% in Japan, and 96% in South Korea. A 32% increase in our work force will yield little advantage to us if our skilling remains at this abysmally low level as it is today.

 

With around 54% of our overall demographic under the age of 25. The age is also a great factor as a large number of them still remain with little to no skills for getting hired in any sector. The demographic boon that we keep harping on is going to anchor us down the ladder of development that we are so led to believe is achievable.

Something a populous nation like India cannot afford.

Solution

Hardly an easy task. Our population is our strength as well as our greatest weakness.

 

A suggestion with regard to more grounded policy plans to secure.

The need of setting a quality standard for skill and work delivered is a major need today. The lack of verifiable quality of work on the behest of the unskilled labourers is something that needs to be worked on. If we cannot skill our labour class to an international standard to meet the compliance as well as deliver on the promise of making our nation a leader is an essential need.

If our unskilled workers are preferring to not wear safety gear while working tough jobs on the mutual understanding of a better pay via compensation on injury or death displays a sorry state on how we are dealing with our labour class in our country.

 

The Skill Campaign needs a serious rework on meeting the requirements of the Labour class on ground.